AiVoman's  \VorK  in 
English  Fiction 

From  tHe  Restoration  to  tHe 
Mid-Victorian  Period 


By 
Clara  H.  WHitmore,  A.M. 


G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons 

New    TforK  and  London 

*Rnicherbocftec  preae 
1910 


COPYRIGHT,  IQOQ 

BV 

CLARA  H.  WHITMORE 


Cbe  •fcnicfeerbocfeer  press,  «ew 


PREFACE 

HE  writings  of  many  of  the  women  consider- 
ed  in  this  volume  have  sunk  into  an  oblivion 
from  which  their  intrinsic  merit  should  have 
preserved  them.  This  is  partly  due  to  the 
fact  that  nearly  all  the  books  on  literature  have 
been  written  from  a  man's  stand-point.  While 
in  other  arts  the  tastes  of  men  and  women  vary 
little,  the  choice  of  novels  is  to  a  large  degree 
determined  by  sex.  Many  men  who  acknow- 
ledge unhesitatingly  that  Jane  Austen  is  superior 
as  an  artist  to  Smollett,  will  rind  more  pleas- 
ure in  the  breezy  adventures  of  Roderick  Ran- 
dom than  in  the  drawing-room  atmosphere  of 
Emma;  while  no  woman  can  read  a  novel  of 
Smollett's  without  loathing,  although  she  must 
acknowledge  that  the  Scottish  writer  is  a  man 
of  genius. 

This  book  is  written  from  a  woman's  view- 
point. Wherever  my  own  judgment  has  been 
different  from  the  generally  accepted  one,  as  in 
the  estimate  of  some  famous  heroines,  the  point 
in  question  has  been  submitted  to  other  women, 
iii 


268533 


IV 


Preface 


and  not  recorded  unless  it  met  with  the  approval 
of  a  large  number  of  women  of  cultivated  taste. 

This  work  was  first  undertaken  at  the  sugges- 
tion of  Dr.  E.  Charlton  Black  of  Boston  Univer- 
sity for  a  Master's  thesis,  and  it  was  due  to  his 
appreciative  words  that  it  was  enlarged  into 
book  form.  I  also  wish  to  thank  Professor 
Ker  of  London  University,  and  Dr.  Henry  A. 
Beers  and  Dr.  Wilbur  L.  Cross  of  Yale  University 
for  the  help  which  I  obtained  from  them  while  a 
student  in  their  classes.  It  is  with  the  deep- 
est sense  of  gratitude  that  I  acknowledge  the 
assistance  given  to  me  in  this  work  by  Mr. 
Charles  Welsh,  at  whose  suggestion  the  scope  of 
the  book  was  enlarged,  and  many  parts  strength- 
ened. I  wish  especially  to  thank  him  for 
calling  my  attention  to  The  Cheap  Repository 
of  Hannah  More,  and  to  the  literary  value  of 
Maria  Edgeworth's  stories  for  children. 

It  is  my  only  hope  that  this  book  may  in  a 
small  measure  fill  a  want  which  a  school-girl 
recently  expressed  to  me:  "Our  Club  wanted  to 
study  about  women,  but  we  have  searched  the 
libraries  and  found  nothing." 

C.  H.  W. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

CHAPTER  I. 

MARGARET  CAVENDISH,  DUCHESS  OF  NEW- 
CASTLE (1624-1674) — APHRA  BEHN 
(1640-1689) — MARY  MANLEY  (1672- 
1724)  i 

CHAPTER  II. 

SARAH  FIELDING  (1710-1768) — ELIZA 
HAYWOOD  (1693-1756) — CHARLOTTE 
LENNOX  (1720-1766) — FRANCES  SHERI- 
DAN (1724-1766)  .  .  24 

CHAPTER  III. 
FRANCES  BURNEY  (1752-1840)  .       45 

CHAPTER  IV. 
HANNAH  MORE  (1745-1833)    •  •       62 

CHAPTER  V. 

CHARLOTTE  SMITH  (1749-1806) — ELIZA- 
BETH INCHBALD  (1753-1821)  .  .  73 


vi  Contents 

PAGB 

CHAPTER  VI. 

CLARA  REEVE  (1725-1803) — ANN  RAD- 
CLIFFE  (1764-1822) — SOPHIA  LEE 
(1750-1824) — HARRIET  LEE  (1766- 
1851) 88 

CHAPTER  VII. 

MARIA  EDGEWORTH  (1767-1849) — LADY 
MORGAN  (1783-1859)  .  .  .  .in 

CHAPTER  VIII. 

ELIZABETH  HAMILTON  (1758-1816) — 
ANNA  PORTER  (1780-1832) — JANE 
PORTER  (1776-1850)  .  .  .  133 

CHAPTER  IX. 

AMELIA  OPIE  (1769-1853) — MARY  BRUN- 
TON  (1778-1818)  .  .  .  149 

CHAPTER  X. 
JANE  AUSTEN  (1775-1817)       .  .     157 

CHAPTER  XL 

SUSAN  EDMONSTONE  FERRIER  (1782-1854) 
— MARY  RUSSELL  MITFORD  (1787-1855) 
— ANNA  MARIA  HALL  (1800-1881)  .  179 


Contents 


Vll 


CHAPTER  XII. 

LADY  CAROLINE  LAMB  (1785-1828) — MARY 
SHELLEY  (1797-1851)  .  .  .  200 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

CATHERINE  GRACE  FRANCES  GORE  (1799- 
1861) — ANNA  ELIZA  BRAY  (1790-1883)  216 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

JULIA  PARDOE  (1806-1862) — FRANCES 
TROLLOPE  (1780-1863) — HARRIET  MA R- 
TINEAU  (1802-1876)  ....  231 

CHAPTER  XV. 

EMILY  BRONTE  (1818-1848) — ANNE 
BRONTE  (1820-1849) — CHARLOTTE 
BRONTE  (1816-1855)  .  .  .247 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

ELIZABETH  CLEGHORN  GASKELL  (1810- 
1865)  ....  .274 

CONCLUSION 293 

INDEX  .  ....     297 


WOMAN'S  WORK  IN 
ENGLISH  FICTION 


CHAPTER  I 

The    Duchess    of  Newcastle.     Mrs. 
Behn.     Mrs.   Manley 

{N  the  many  volumes  containing  the  records 
of  the  past,  the  names  of  few  women  appear, 
and  the  number  is  still  smaller  of  those  who 
have  won  fame  in  art  or  literature.  Sappho, 
however,  has  shown  that  poetic  feeling  and  ex- 
pression are  not  denied  the  sex;  Jeanne  d'Arc 
was  chosen  to  free  France;  Mrs.  Somerville  ex- 
celled in  mathematics;  Maria  Mitchell  ranked 
among  the  great  astronomers;  Rosa  Bonheur 
had  the  stroke  of  a  master.  These  women 
possessed  genius,  and  one  is  tempted  to  ask 
why  more  women  have  not  left  enduring  work, 
especially  in  the  realm  of  art.  The  Madonna  and 
Child,  what  a  subject  for  a  woman's  brush! 
Yet  the  joy  of  maternity  which  shines  in  a 
i 


2        Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

mother's  eyes  has  seldom  been  expressed  by 
her  in  words  or  on  canvas.  It  was  left  for  a 
man,  William  Blake,  to  write  some  of  our 
sweetest  songs  of  childhood. 

But  as  soon  as  the  novel  appeared,  a  host 
of  women  writers  sprang  up.  Women  have 
always  been  story-tellers.  Long  before  Homer 
sang  of  the  fall  of  Troy,  the  Grecian  matrons  at 
their  spinning  related  to  their  maids  the  story 
of  Helen's  infidelity;  and,  as  they  thought  of 
their  husbands  and  sons  who  had  fallen  for  her 
sake,  the  story  did  not  lack  in  fervour.  But  the 
minstrels  have  always  had  this  advantage  over 
the  story-tellers:  their  words,  sung  to  the  lyre, 
were  crystallised  in  rhythmic  form,  so  that  they 
resisted  the  action  of  time,  while  only  the  sub- 
stance of  the  stories,  not  the  words  which  gave 
them  beauty  and  power,  could  be  retained,  and 
consequently  they  crumbled  away.  When  the 
novel  took  on  literary  form,  women  began  to 
write.  They  were  not  imitators  of  men,  but 
opened  up  new  paths  of  fiction,  in  many  of 
which  they  excelled. 

The  first  woman  to  essay  prose  fiction  as 
an  art  was  Margaret,  Queen  of  Navarre.  In 
the  seventy-two  tales  of  The  Heptameron,  a 
book  written  before  the  dawn  of  realism,  she 
related  many  anecdotes  of  her  brother,  Francis 
the  First,  and  his  courtiers.  Woman's  per- 
manent influence  over  the  novel  began  about 


The  Duchess  of  Newcastle        3 

1640,  and  was  due  directly  to  the  Hotel  Ram- 
bouillet,  in  whose  grand  salon  there  mingled 
freely  for  half  a  century  the  noblest  minds 
of  France.  This  salon  was  presided  over  by 
the  Marquise  de  Rambouillet,  who  had  left 
the  licentious  court  of  Henry  the  Fourth,  and 
had  formed  here  in  her  home  between  the 
Louvre  and  the  Tuileries  a  little  academy, 
where  Corneille  read  his  tragedies  before  they 
were  published,  and  Bousset  preached  his  first 
sermon,  while  among  the  listeners  were  the 
beautiful  Duchess  de  Longueville,  Madame  de 
Lafayette,  Madame  de  Sevigne*  and  Mademoi- 
selle de  Scude'ri,  besides  other  persons  of  royal 
birth  or  of  genius.  The  ladies  of  this  salon  be- 
came the  censors  of  the  manners,  the  literature, 
and  even  the  language  of  France.  Here  was 
the  first  group  of  women  writers  whose  fame  ex- 
tended beyond  their  own  country,  and  has  lasted, 
though  somewhat  dimmed,  to  the  present. 
Since  the  seventeenth  century  the  influence  of 
women  novelists  has  been  ever  widening. 

In  England,  women  entered  the  domain  of 
literature  later  than  in  France,  Spain,  or  Italy. 
Not  until  the  Restoration  did  they  take  any 
active  part  in  the  world  of  letters ;  and  not  until 
the  reign  of  George  the  Third  did  they  make  any 
marked  contribution  to  fiction. 

The  first  woman  writer  of  prose  fiction  in 
England  was  the  thrice  noble  and  illustri- 


4        Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

ous  Princess  Margaret,  Duchess  of  Newcastle. 
During  the  Commonwealth,  the  Duke  and 
Duchess  of  Newcastle  had  lived  in  exile,  but 
with  the  restoration  of  Charles  the  Second,  in 
1660,  they  returned  to  London,  where  the 
Duchess  soon  became  a  notable  personage. 
Crowds  gathered  in  the  park  merely  to  see  her 
pass,  attracted  partly  by  her  fame  as  a  writer, 
partly  by  the  singularities  she  affected.  Her 
black  coach  furnished  with  white  curtains  and 
adorned  with  silver  trimmings  instead  of  gilt, 
with  the  footmen  dressed  in  long  black  coats, 
was  readily  distinguished  from  other  carriages 
in  the  park.  Her  peculiarities  of  dress  were  no 
less  marked.  Her  long  black  juste-au-corps,  her 
hair  hanging  in  curls  about  her  bared  neck,  her 
much  beplumed  velvet  cap  of  her  own  designing, 
were  objects  of  ridicule  to  the  court  wits,  who 
even  asserted  that  she  wore  more  than  the  usual 
number  of  black  patches  upon  her  comely  face. 
More  singular  than  her  habiliments  were  her 
pretentions  as  a  woman  of  letters,  which  caused 
the  courtiers  to  laugh  at  her  conceit.  She  was 
evidently  aware  of  this  failing  as  she  writes  in 
her  Autobiography:  "I  fear  my  ambition  inclines 
to  vain-glory,  for  I  am  very  ambitious ;  yet  't  is 
neither  for  beauty,  wit,  titles,  wealth,  or  power, 
but  as  they  are  steps  to  raise  me  to  Fame's 
tower,  which  is  to  live  by  remembrance  in 
after-ages." 


The  Duchess  of  Newcastle        5 

But,  notwithstanding  her  detractors,  she  re- 
ceived sufficient  praise  to  foster  her  belief  in 
her  own  genius.  Her  plays  were  well  received. 
Her  poems  were  declared  by  her  admirers  equal 
to  Shakespeare's.  Her  philosophical  works, 
which  she  dedicated  to  the  great  universities 
of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  were  accepted  with 
fulsome  flattery  of  their  author.  When  she 
visited  the  Royal  Society  at  Arundel  House,  the 
Lord  President  met  her  at  the  door,  and,  with 
mace  carried  before  him,  escorted  her  into  the 
room,  where  many  experiments  were  performed 
for  her  pleasure.  In  1676,  a  folio  volume  was 
published,  entitled  Letters  and  Poems  in  Honour 
of  the  Incomparable  Princess  Margaret,  Duchess 
of  Newcastle,  written  by  men  of  high  rank  and  of 
learning,  with  the  following  dedication  by  the 
University  of  Cambridge: 

To  Margaret  the  First : 

Princess  of  Philosophers : 

Who  hath  dispelled  errors: 

Appeased  the  difference  of  opinions: 

And  restored  Peace 
To  Learning's  Commonwealth. 

Yet  this  praise  was  not  all  flattery,  for  the 
scholarly  Evelyn  always  speaks  of  her  with 
respect,  and  after  visiting  her  writes,  "I  was 
much  pleased  with  the  extraordinary  fanciful 
habit,  garb,  and  discourse  of  the  Duchess." 
Amid  the  arid  wastes  of  her  philosophical 


6        Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

works  are  green  spots  enlivened  by  good  sense 
and  humour  that  have  a  peculiar  charm.  At 
the  time  when  the  trained  minds  of  the  Royal 
Society  were  broadening  scientific  knowledge 
by  careful  experiments,  this  lady,  with  practi- 
cally no  education,  sat  herself  down  to  write 
her  thoughts  upon  the  great  subjects  of  matter 
and  motion,  mind  and  body.  She  was  em- 
boldened to  publish  her  opinions,  for,  as  she 
says:  "Although  it  is  probable,  that  some 
of  the  Opinions  of  Ancient  Philosophers  in 
Ancient  times  are  erroneous,  yet  not  all,  neither 
are  all  Modern  Opinions  Truths,  but  truly  I 
believe,  there  are  more  Errors  in  the  One 
than  Truth  in  the  Other."  Some  of  her  ex- 
planations are  very  artless,  as  when  she  decides 
that  passions  are  created  in  the  heart  and  not 
in  the  head,  because  "Passion  and  Judgment 
seldom  agree." 

Her  philosophical  works  are  often  compounded 
of  fiction  and  fact.  Her  book  called  The  De- 
scription of  a  New  World  called  the  Blazing  World 
reminds  one  of  some  of  the  marvellous  stories 
of  Jules  Verne.  According  to  the  story  a 
merchant  fell  in  love  with  a  lady  while  she  was 
gathering  shells  on  the  sea-coast,  and  carried 
her  away  in  a  light  vessel.  They  were  driven 
to  the  north  pole,  thence  to  the  pole  of  another 
world  which  joined  it.  The  conjunction  of  these 
two  poles  doubled  the  cold,  so  that  it  was  insup- 


The  Duchess  of  Newcastle        7 

portable,  and  all  died  but  the  lady.  Bear-men 
conducted  her  to  a  warmer  clime,  and  presented 
her  to  the  emperor  of  the  Blazing  World,  whose 
palace  was  of  gold,  with  floors  of  diamonds. 
The  emperor  married  the  lady,  and,  at  her  desire 
to  study  philosophy,  sent  for  the  Duchess 
of  Newcastle,  "a  plain  and  rational  writer," 
to  be  her  teacher.  The  story  at  this  point 
rambles  into  philosophy. 

Nature's  Pictures  drawn  by  Fancy's  Pencil  con- 
tains many  suggestions  for  poems  and  novels. 
Particularly  beautiful  is  the  fragment  of  a  story 
of  a  lord  and  lady  who  were  forbidden  to  love 
in  this  world,  but  who  died  the  same  night, 
and  met  on  the  shores  of  the  Styx.  "  Their 
souls  did  mingle  and  intermix  as  liquid  essences, 
whereby  their  souls  became  as  one."  They 
preferred  to  enjoy  themselves  thus  rather  than 
go  to  Elysium,  where  they  might  be  separated, 
and  where  the  talk  of  the  shades  was  always 
of  the  past,  which  to  them  was  full  of  sorrow. 

The  Duchess  of  Newcastle  wrote  a  series  of 
letters  on  beauty,  eloquence,  time,  theology, 
servants,  wit,  and  kindred  subjects,  often  illus- 
trated by  a  little  story,  reminding  the  reader  of 
some  of  the  Spectator  papers,  which  delighted  the 
next  generation.  As  in  those  papers,  characters 
were  introduced.  Mrs.  P.I.,  the  Puritan  dame, 
appears  in  several  letters.  She  had  received 
sanctification,  and  consequently  considered  all 


8        Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

vanities  of  dress,  such  as  curls,  bare  necks, 
black  patches,  fans,  ribbons,  necklaces,  and 
pendants,  temptations  of  Satan  and  the  signs 
of  damnation.  In  a  subsequent  letter  she 
becomes  a  preaching  sister,  and  the  Duchess 
has  been  to  hear  her,  and  thus  comments  upon 
the  meeting:  "There  were  a  great  many  holy 
sisters  and  holy  brethren  met  together,  where 
many  took  their  turns  to  preach ;  for  as  they  are 
for  liberty  of  conscience,  so  they  are  for  liberty 
of  preaching.  But  there  were  more  sermons 
than  learning,  and  more  words  than  reason." 

This  is  the  first  example  of  the  use  of  letters 
in  English  fiction.  In  the  next  century  it  was 
adopted  by  Richardson  for  his  three  great 
novels,  Pamela,  Clarissa  Harlowe,  and  Sir 
Charles  Grandison;  it  was  used  by  Smollett  in  the 
novel  of  Humphry  Clinker,  and  became  a  popular 
mode  of  composition  with  many  lesser  writers. 

But  posterity  is  chiefly  indebted  to  the  Duchess 
of  Newcastle  for  her  life  of  her  husband  and 
the  autobiography  that  accompanies  it.  Of  the 
former  Charles  Lamb  wrote  that  it  was  a  jewel 
for  which  "no  casket  is  rich  enough."  Of  the 
beaux  and  belles  who  were  drawn  by  the  ready 
pens  of  the  playwrights  of  the  court  of  Charles 
the  Second  none  are  worthy  of  a  place  beside  the 
Duke  of  Newcastle  and  his  incomparable  wife. 

With  rare  felicity  she  has  described  her  home 
life  in  London  with  her  brothers  and  sisters 


The  Duchess  of  Newcastle        9 

before  her  marriage.  Their  chief  amusements 
were  a  ride  in  their  coaches  about  the  streets  of 
the  city,  a  visit  to  Spring  Gardens  and  Hyde 
Park;  and  sometimes  a  sail  in  the  barges  on  the 
river,  where  they  had  music  and  supper.  She 
announces  with  dignity  her  first  meeting  with 
the  Duke  of  Newcastle  in  Paris,  where  she  was 
maid  of  honour  to  the  Queen  Mother  of  England : 
' '  He  was  pleased  to  take  some  particular  notice  of 
me,  and  express  more  than  an  ordinary  affection 
for  me ;  insomuch  that  he  resolved  to  choose  me 
for  his  second  wife."  And  in  another  place 
she  writes:  "I  could  not,  nor  had  not  the 
power  to  refuse  him,  by  reason  my  affections  were 
fixed  on  him,  and  he  was  the  only  person  I 
ever  was  in  love  with.  Neither  was  I  ashamed 
to  own  it,  but  gloried  therein."  Here  is  the 
charm  of  brevity.  Richardson  would  have 
blurred  these  clearly  cut  sentences  by  eight 
volumes. 

In  the  biography  of  her  husband  she  relates 
faithfully  his  services  to  Charles  the  First  at 
the  head  of  an  army  which  he  himself  had 
raised ;  his  final  defeat  near  York  by  the  Parlia- 
mentary forces ;  and  his  escape  to  the  continent 
in  1644.  Then  followed  his  sixteen  years  of 
exile  in  Paris,  Rotterdam,  and  Antwerp,  where 
"he  lived  freely  and  nobly,"  entertaining  many 
persons  of  quality,  although  he  was  often  in 
extreme  poverty,  and  could  obtain  credit  merely 


io      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

by  the  love  and  respect  which  his  presence 
inspired.  What  a  sad  picture  is  given  of  the 
return  of  the  exiles  to  their  estates,  which  had 
been  laid  waste  in  the  Civil  War  and  later  con- 
fiscated by  Cromwell!  But  how  the  greatness 
of  the  true  gentleman  shines  through  it  all, 
who,  as  he  viewed  one  of  his  parks,  seven  of 
which  had  been  completely  destroyed,  simply 
said,  "He  had  been  in  hopes  it  would  not  have 
been  so  much  defaced  as  he  found  it." 

In  the  closing  chapter  the  Duchess  gives 
Discourses  Gathered  from  the  Mouth  of  my  noble 
Lord  and  Husband.  These  show  both  sound 
sense  and  a  broad  view  of  affairs.  She  writes: 

"I  have  heard  My  Lord  say, 
I 

"That  those  which  command  the  Wealth  of 
a  Kingdom,  command  the  hearts  and  hands 
of  the  People. 

XXXIII 

' '  That  many  Laws  do  rather  entrap  than  help 
the  subject." 

Clarendon,  who  thought  but  poorly  of  the 
Duke's  abilities  as  a  general,  gives  the  same 
characterisation  of  him:  a  man  of  exact  pro- 
portion, pleasant,  witty,  free  but  courtly  in  his 
manner,  who  loved  all  that  were  his  friends, 
and  hated  none  that  were  his  enemies,  and  who 


The  Duchess  of  Newcastle      n 

had  proved  his  loyalty  to  his  king  by  the  sacrifice 
of  his  property  and  at  the  risk  of  his  life. 

Perhaps  the  Duchess  of  Newcastle  has  un- 
wittingly drawn  a  true  representation  of  the 
great  body  of  English  cavaliers,  and  has  partly 
removed  the  stain  which  the  immoralities  of  the 
court  afterward  put  upon  the  name.  These 
biographies  give  a  story  of  marital  felicity  with 
all  the  characteristics  of  the  domestic  novel. 

At  this  time  the  English  novel  was  a  crude, 
formless  thing,  without  dignity  in  literature. 
The  Duchess  of  Newcastle,  who  aspired  to  be 
ranked  with  Homer  and  Plato,  would  have 
spurned  a  place  among  writers  of  romance,  al- 
though her  genius  was  primarily  that  of  the 
novelist.  She  constantly  thought  of  plots, 
which  she  jotted  down  at  random,  her  common 
method  of  composition.  She  has  described 
characters,  and  has  left  many  bright  pictures  of 
the  manners  and  customs  of  her  age.  Her 
style  of  writing  is  better  than  that  of  many  of 
her  more  scholarly  contemporaries,  who  studied 
Latin  models  and  strove  to  imitate  them.  She 
wrote  as  she  thought  and  felt,  so  that  her  style 
is  simple  when  not  lost  in  the  mazes  of  philoso- 
phical speculation.  She  had  all  the  requisites 
necessary  to  write  the  great  novel  of  the 
Restoration. 

But  in  the  next  century  her  voluminous 
writings  were  forgotten,  and  the  casual  visitor 


12      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

to  Westminster  Abbey  who  paused  before  the 
imposing  monument  in  the  north  transept  read 
with  amused  indifference  the  quaint  inscription 
which  marks  the  tomb  of  the  noble  pair ;  that  she 
was  the  second  wife  of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle, 
that  her  name  was  Margaret  Lucas;  "a  noble 
family,  for  all  the  brothers  were  valiant  and 
all  the  sisters  were  virtuous."  To  Charles  Lamb 
belongs  the  credit  of  discovering  the  worth  of  her 
writings.  Delighting  in  oddities,  but  quick  to 
discern  truth  from  falsehood,  he  loved  to  pore 
over  the  old  folios  containing  her  works,  and 
could  not  quite  forgive  his  sister  Mary  for  speak- 
ing disrespectfully  of  "the  intellectuals  of  a  dear 
favourite  of  mine  of  the  last  century  but  one  — 
the  thrice  noble,  chaste  and  virtuous,  but  again 
somewhat  fantastical  and  original-brained,  gen- 
erous Margaret  Newcastle." 

Her  desire  for  immortality  is  nearer  its  ful- 
filment to-day  than  at  any  previous  time.  A 
third  edition  of  the  Life  of  the  Duke  of  New- 
castle was  published  in  1675,  the  vear  after  her 
death.  Nearly  two  hundred  years  later,  in  1872, 
it  was  included  in  Russell  Smith's  "Library 
of  Old  Authors,"  and  since  then  a  modernised 
English  edition  and  a  French  edition  of  this 
book  have  been  published.  No  one  can  read 
this  biography  without  feeling  the  charm  of  the 
quaint,  childlike  personality  of  the  Duchess  of 
Newcastle. 


Mrs.  Behn  13 

While  all  London  was  talking  of  the  "mad 
Duchess  of  Newcastle,"  another  lady  was  living 
there  no  less  eminent  as  a  writer,  but  so  dis- 
tinguished for  her  wit,  freedom  of  temper,  and 
brilliant  conversation,  that  even  the  great 
Dry  den  sought  her  friendship,  and  Sothern, 
Rochester,  and  Wycherley  were  among  her  ad- 
mirers. She  was  named  "  Astrea,"  and  hailed  as 
the  wonder  and  glory  of  her  sex.  But  Aphra 
Behn's  talents  brought  her  a  more  substantial 
reward  than  fame.  Her  plays  were  presented 
to  crowded  houses;  her  novels  .were  in  every 
library,  and  she  obtained  a  large  income  from 
her  writings;  she  was  the  first  English  woman 
to  earn  a  living  by  her  pen. 

In  her  early  youth,  Mrs.  Behn  lived  for  a  time 
at  Surinam  in  Dutch  Guiana,  where  her  father 
was  governor.  On  one  of  the  plantations  was 
a  negro  in  whose  fate  she  became  deeply  in- 
terested. She  learned  from  his  own  lips  about 
his  life  in  Africa,  and  was  herself  an-  eye  witness 
of  the  indignities  and  tortures  he  suffered  in 
slavery.  She  was  so  deeply  impressed  by  his 
horrible  fate,  that  on  her  return  to  London 
she  related  his  story  to  King  Charles  the  Second 
and  at  his  request  elaborated  it  into  the  novel 
Oroonoko.  ^ 

According  to  the  story,  Oroonoko,  an  African 
warrior,  was  married  to  Imoinda,  a  beautiful 
maiden  of  his  own  people.  His  grandfather,  a 


14      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

powerful  chieftain,  also  fell  in  love  with  the 
beautiful  Imoinda  and  placed  her  in  his  harem. 
When  he  found  that  her  love  for  Oroonoko  still 
continued,  he  sold  her  secretly  into  slavery  and 
her  rightful  husband  could  learn  nothing  of  her 
whereabouts.  Later  Oroonoko  and  his  men 
were  invited  by  the  captain  of  a  Dutch  trading 
ship  to  dine  on  board  his  vessel.  They  accepted 
the  invitation,  but,  after  dinner,  the  captain 
seized  his  guests,  threw  them  into  chains,  and 
carried  them  to  the  West  Indies,  where  he  sold 
them  as  slaves.  Here  Oroonoko  found  his 
wife,  whose  loss  he  had  deeply  mourned,  and 
they  were  reunited.  Oroonoko,  however,  indig- 
nant at  the  treachery  practised  against  himself 
and  his  men,  incited  the  slaves  to  a  revolt. 
They  were  overcome,  and  Oroonoko  was  tied 
to  a  whipping-post  and  severely  punished.  As 
he  found  that  he  could  not  escape,  he  resolved 
to  die.  But  rather  than  leave  Imoinda  to  the 
cruelty  of  her  owners,  he  determined  to  slay 
first  his  wife,  then  his  enemies,  lastly  himself. 
He  told  his  plans  to  Imoinda,  who  willingly 
accompanied  him  into  the  forest,  where  he  put 
her  to  death.  When  he  saw  his  wife  dead  at  his 
feet,  his  grief  was  so  great  that  it  deprived  him 
of  the  strength  to  take  vengeance  on  his  enemies. 
He  was  again  captured  and  led  to  a  stake, 
where  faggots  were  placed  about  him.  The  au- 
thor has  described  his  death  with  a  faithfulness 


Mrs.  Behn  15 

to  detail  that  carries  with  it  the  impress  of 
truth:  "  'My  Friends,  am  I  to  die,  or  to  be 
whipt?'  And  they  cry'd,  'Whipt!  no,  you 
shall  not  escape  so  well.'  And  then  he  reply 'd, 
smiling,  'A  blessing  on  thee';  and  assured  them 
they  need  not  tie  him,  for  he  would  stand  fix'd 
like  a  Rock,  and  endure  Death  so  as  should 
encourage  them  to  die:  'But  if  you  whip  me' 
[said  he],  'be  sure  you  tie  me  fast.'  ' 

The  popularity  of  the  book  was  instantaneous. 
It  passed  through  several  editions.  It  was  trans- 
lated into  French  and  German,  and  adapted  for 
the  German  stage,  while  Sothern  put  it  on  the 
stage  in  England.  It  created  almost  as  great  a 
sensation  as  did  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin  two  hundred 
years  later.  Like  Mrs.  Stowe's  novel  it  had  a 
strong  moral  influence,  as  it  was  among  the 
earliest  efforts  to  call  the  attention  of  Europe 
to  the  evils  of  the  African  slave  trade.  More- 
over, this  her  first  novel  gave  Mrs.  Behn  an 
acknowledged  place  as  a  writer. 

Oroonoko  marks  a  distinct  advance  in  English 
fiction.  Nearly  all  novels  before  this  had 
consisted  of  a  series  of  stories  held  together  by 
a  loosely  formed  plot  running  through  a  number 
of  volumes,  sometimes  only  five,  but  occasion- 
ally, as  in  The  Grand  Cyrus,  filling  ten  quartos. 
Their  form  was  such  that  like  the  Thousand  and 
One  Nights  they  could  be  continued  indefi- 
nitely. Most  of  these  novels  belonged  either 


1 6      Woman* s  Work  in  Fiction 

to  the  pastoral  romance  or  the  historical  allegory. 
In  the  former  the  ladies  and  gentlemen  who  in  a 
desultory  sort  of  way  carried  on  the  plot  were 
disguised  as  shepherds  and  shepherdesses  and 
lived  in  idyllic  state  in  Arcadia.  In  the  latter 
they  masqueraded  under  the  names  of  kings  and 
queens  of  antiquity  and  entered  with  the  flourish 
of  trumpets  and  the  sound  of  drums. 

Oroonoko  was  the  first  English  novel  with  a 
well  developed  plot.  It  moves  along  rapidly, 
without  digression,  to  its  tragic  conclusion. 
Not  until  Fielding  wrote  Joseph  Andrews  was 
the  plot  of  any  English  novel  so  definitely 
wrought.  The  lesser  writer  had  a  slight  ad- 
vantage over  the  greater.  Mrs.  Behn's  novel 
is  constructed  upon  dramatic  lines,  so  that  it 
holds  the  interest  more  closely  to  the  main 
characters,  and  the  end  is  awaited  with  intense 
expectation ;  while  Fielding  chose  the  epic  form, 
which  is  more  discursive,  and  Joseph  Andrews 
like  all  his  novels  is  excessively  tame,  almost 
hackneyed  in  its  conclusion.  Mrs.  Behn's  black 
hero  is  the  first  distinctly  drawn  character  in 
English  fiction,  the  first  one  that  has  any 
marked  personality.  Sometimes  the  enthusiasm 
with  which  he  is  described  brings  a  smile  to  the 
lips  of  the  modern  reader  and  reminds  one  of 
the  heroic  savages  of  James  Fenimore  Cooper 
and  Helen  Hunt  Jackson.  She  writes  of  him: 
"He  was  pretty  tall,  but  of  a  Shape  the  most 


Mrs.  Behn  17 

exact  that  can  be  Fancy'd:  The  most  famous 
Statuary  could  not  form  the  Figure  of  a  Man 
more  admirably  turned  from  Head  to  Foot.  .  .  . 
There  was  no  one  Grace  wanting,  that  bears  the 
Standard  of  true  Beauty."  And  thus  she  con- 
tinues the  description  in  the  superlative  degree. 

But  the  story  is  for  the  most  part  realistic. 
Although  the  scenes  in  Africa  show  the  influence 
of  the  French  heroic  novels,  as  if  the  author  were 
afraid  to  leave  her  story  in  its  simple  truth  but 
must  adorn  it  with  purple  and  ermine,  as  soon 
as  it  is  transferred  to  Surinam,  where  Mrs.  Behn 
had  lived,  it  becomes  real.  It  has  local  colouring, 
at  that  time  an  almost  unknown  attribute.  It 
has  the  atmosphere  of  the  tropics.  The  de- 
scriptions are  vivid,  and  often  photographic. 
Occasionally  they  are  exaggerated,  but  few  trav- 
ellers to  a  region  of  which  their  hearers  know 
nothing  have  been  able  to  resist  the  temptation 
to  deviate  from  the  exact  truth.  But  the 
whole  novel,  even  at  this  late  day,  leaves  one 
with  the  impression  that  it  is  a  true  biography. 

In  the  history  of  the  English  novel,  in  which 
Pamela  is  given  an  important  place  as  the 
morning  star  which  heralded  the  great  light  of 
English  realism  about  to  burst  upon  the  world, 
this  well  arranged,  definite,  picturesque  story 
of  Oroonoko,  whose  author  was  reposing  quietly 
within  the  hallowed  precincts  of  Westminster 
Abbey  fifty  years  before  Richardson  introduced 


1 8      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Pamela  to  an  admiring  public,  should  not  be 
forgotten.  Before  Pamela  was  published,  the 
complete  works  of  Mrs.  Behn  passed  through 
eight  editions.  The  plots  of  all  her  novels  are 
well  constructed,  with  little  extraneous  matter, 
but  with  the  exception  of  Oroonoko  the  charac- 
ters are  shadowy  beings,  many  of  whom  meet 
with  a  violent  death.  The  Nun  or  the  Perjured 
Duty  has  only  five  characters,  all  of  whom  perish 
in  the  meshes  of  love.  The  Fair  Jilt  or  the 
Amours  of  Prince  Tarquin  and  Miranda,  founded 
on  incidents  that  came  to  the  author's  knowledge 
during  her  residence  in  Antwerp,  is  well  fitted 
for  the  columns  of  a  modern  yellow  journal ;  the 
beautiful  heroine  causes  the  death  of  everyone 
who  stands  in  the  way  of  her  love  or  her  am- 
bition, but  she  finally  repents  and  lives  happy 
ever  after.  Mrs.  Behn's  style  is  always  careless, 
owing  to  her  custom  of  writing  while  entertain- 
ing friends. 

A  great  change  took  place  in  the  public  taste 
during  the  next  hundred  years,  so  that  Mrs. 
Behn's  novels,  plays,  and  poems  fell  into  disre- 
pute. Sir  Walter  Scott  tells  the  story  of  his 
grand-aunt  who  expressed  a  desire  to  see  again 
Mrs.  Behn's  novels,  which  she  had  read  with  de- 
light in  her  youth.  He  sent  them  to  her  sealed 
and  marked  "private  and  confidential."  The 
next  time  he  saw  her,  she  gave  them  back 
with  the  words: 


Mrs.  Manley  19 

"Take  back  your  bonny  Mrs.  Behn,  and,  if 
you  will  take  my  advice,  put  her  in  the  fire,  for 
I  find  it  impossible  to  get  through  the  very  first 
novel.  But  is  it  not  a  very  odd  thing  that  I, 
an  old  woman  of  eighty  and  upward,  sitting 
alone,  feel  myself  ashamed  to  read  a  book  which 
sixty  years  ago  I  have  heard  read  aloud  for  the 
amusement  of  large  circles,  consisting  of  the 
first  and  most  creditable  society  in  London?" 

Mrs.  Behn  has  been  accused  of  great  license  in 
her  conduct  and  of  gross  immorality  in  her 
writings.  Her  friend  and  biographer  says  of  the 
former:  "For  my  part  I  knew  her  intimately, 
and  never  saw  ought  unbecoming  the  just 
modesty  of  our  sex,  though  more  free  and  gay 
than  the  folly  of  the  precise  will  allow."  For 
the  latter  the  fashion  must  be  blamed  more  than 
she.  Mrs.  Behn  was  not  actuated  by  the  high 
moral  principles  of  Mademoiselle  de  Scude"ri 
and  Madame  de  Lafayette,  with  whom  love 
was  an  ennobling  passion,  nor  was  she  writing 
for  the  refined  men  and  women  of  the  Hotel 
Rambouillet;  she  was  striving  to  earn  a  living 
by  pleasing  the  court  of  Charles  the  Second, 
and  in  that  she  was  eminently  successful. 

Nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century  after  the  death 
of  Mrs.  Behn,  Mrs.  Manley  published  anony- 
mously the  first  two  volumes  of  the  New  Ata- 
lantis,  the  book  by  which  she  is  chiefly  known, 


20      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

under  the  title  of  Secret  Metnoirs  and  Manners  of 
Several  Persons  of  Quality  of  both  Sexes  from  the 
New  Atalantis,  an  Island  in  the  Mediterranean. 
Mrs.  Manley  was  a  Tory,  and  she  peopled  the 
New  Atalantis  with  members  of  the  Whig  party 
under  Marlborough  as  Prince  Fortunatus.  The 
book  is  written  in  the  form  of  a  conversation 
carried  on  by  Astrea,  Virtue,  and  Intelligence,  a 
personification  of  the  Court  Gazette.  They  de- 
scribed the  Whig  leaders  so  accurately,  and 
related  the  scandal  of  the  court  so  faithfully, 
that,  although  fictitious  names  were  used,  no 
key  was  needed  to  recognise  the  personages  in 
the  story. 

The  publisher  and  printer  were  arrested  for 
libel,  but  Mrs.  Manley  came  forward  and  owned 
the  authorship.  In  her  trial  she  was  placed 
under  a  severe  cross-examination  by  Lord  Sun- 
derland,  who  attempted  to  learn  where  she 
had  obtained  her  information.  She  persisted 
in  her  statement  that  no  real  characters  were 
meant,  that  it  was  all  a  work  of  imagination, 
but  if  it  bore  any  resemblance  to  truth  it  must 
have  come  to  her  by  inspiration.  Upon  Lord 
Sunderland's  objecting  to  this  statement,  on  the 
grounds  that  so  immoral  a  book  bore  no  trace 
of  divine  impulse,  she  replied  that  there  were 
evil  angels  as  well  as  good,  who  might  possess 
equal  powers  of  inspiration.  The  book  was 
published  in  May,  1709;  in  the  following 


Mrs.  Manley  21 

ary,  she  was  discharged  by  order  of  the  Queen's 
Bench. 

Soon  after  her  discharge  from  court,  she  wrote 
a  third  and  fourth  volume  of  the  New  Atalantis 
under  the  title,  Memoirs  of  Europe  toward  the 
Close  of  the  Eighth  Century  written  by  Eginardus, 
Secretary  and  Favorite  to  Charlemagne,  and  done 
into  English,  by  the  Translator  of  the  New  Atalan- 
tis. Here  she  has  followed  the  French  models. 
There  is  a  loosely  constructed  plot,  and  the 
characters  tell  a  series  of  stories.  Many  of  the 
writers  of  Queen  Anne's  reign  are  described 
with  none  of  that  lustre  that  surrounds  them 
now,  but  as  they  appeared  to  a  cynical  woman 
who  knew  them  well.  She  refers  to  Steele  as 
Don  Phaebo,  and  ridicules  his  search  for  the 
philosopher's  stone;  and  laments  that  Addison, 
whom  she  calls  Maro,  should  prostitute  his 
talents  for  gold,  when  he  might  become  a  second 
Vergil. 

Mrs.  Manley  had  been  well  trained  to  write  a 
book  like  the  New  Atalantis.  At  sixteen,  an 
age  when  Addison  and  Steele  were  at  the  Char- 
terhouse preparing  for  Oxford,  her  father,  Sir 
Roger  Manley,  died.  A  cousin,  taking  advan- 
tage of  her  helplessness,  deceived  her  by  a 
false  marriage,  and  after  three  years  abandoned 
her.  Upon  this  she  entered  the  household  of  the 
Duchess  of  Cleveland,  the  mistress  of  Charles 
the  Second,  who  soon  tired  of  her  and  dismissed 


22      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

her  from  her  service.  She  then  began  to  write, 
and  by  her  plays  and  political  articles  soon  won 
an  acknowledged  place  among  the  writers  of 
Grub  Street. 

From  the  many  references  to  her  in  the  letters 
and  journals  of  the  period,  she  seems  to  have 
been  popular  with  the  writers  of  both  political 
parties.  Swift  writes  to  Stella  that  she  is  a 
very  generous  person  "for  one  of  that  sort," 
which  many  little  incidents  prove.  She  dedi- 
cated her  play  Lucius  to  Steele,  with  whom  she 
was  on  alternate  terms  of  enmity  and  friendship, 
as  a  public  retribution  for  her  ridicule  of  him  in 
the  New  Atalantis,  saying  that  "scandal  between 
Whig  and  Tory  goes  for  not."  Steele,  equally 
generous,  wrote  a  prologue  for  the  play,  perhaps 
in  retribution  for  some  of  the  harsh  criticisms 
of  her  in  the  Taller.  All  readers  of  Pope  remem- 
ber the  reference  to  her  in  the  Rape  of  the  Lock, 
where  Lord  Petre  exclaims  that  his  honour,  name 
and  praise  shall  live 

As  long  as  Atalantis  shall  be  read. 

Although  Mrs.  Manley's  pen  was  constantly 
and  effectively  employed  in  the  interest  of  the 
Tory  party,  she  being  at  one  time  the  editor  of 
the  Examiner,  the  Tory  organ,  none  of  her  writ- 
ings had  the  popularity  of  the  New  Atalantis. 
It  went  through  seven  editions  and  was  trans- 
lated into  the  French.  The  book  has  no  intrinsic 


Mrs.  Manley  23 

merit;  its  language  is  scurrilous  and  obscene; 
but  it  appealed  to  the  eager  curiosity  of  the 
public  concerning  the  private  immoralities  of 
men  and  women  who  were  prominent  at  court. 
Human  nature  in  its  pages  furnishes  a  con- 
temptible spectacle. 

The  New  Atalantis  has  now,  however,  as- 
sumed a  permanent  place  in  the  history  of  fic- 
tion. This  species  of  writing  had  been  common, 
in  France,  but  it  was  the  first  English  novel 
in  which  political  and  personal  scandal  formed 
the  groundwork  of  a  romance.  Swift  followed 
its  general  plan  in  Gulliver's  Travels,  placing  his 
political  enemies  in  public  office  in  Lilliput  and 
Brobdingnag,  only  he  so  wrought  upon  them 
with  his  imagination  that  he  gave  to  the  world 
a  finished  work  of  art,  while  Mrs.  Manley  has 
left  only  the  raw  material  with  which  the  artist 
works.  Smollett's  political  satire,  Adventures  of 
an  Atom,  was  also  suggested  by  the  New  Atalan- 
tis, but  here  the  earlier  writer  has  surpassed  the 
later.  All  three  of  these  writers  took  a  low  and 
cynical  view  of  humanity. 

The  women  novelists  who  directly  followed 
Mrs.  Manley  did  not  have  her  strength,  but 
they  had  a  delicacy  that  has  given  to  their 
writings  a  subtle  charm.  From  the  time  of 
Sarah  Fielding  to  the  present  threatened  reaction 
the  writings  of  women  have  been  marked  by 
chastity  of  thought  and  purity  of  expression. 


CHAPTER  II 

Sarah  Fielding.     Mrs.  Lennox. 

Mrs.   Haywood.     Mrs.  Sheridan 

ABOUT  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
some  interesting  novels  were  written  by 
women,  but  their  fame  was  so  overshadowed 
by  the  early  masters  of  English  fiction,  who 
were  then  writing,  that  they  have  been  almost 
forgotten.  For  in  1740  Pamela  was  published, 
the  first  novel  of  Samuel  Richardson;  in  1771, 
Humphry  Clinker  appeared,  the  last  novel 
of  Tobias  Smollett;  and  during  the  thirty-one 
years  between  these  two  dates  all  the  books 
of  Richardson,  Fielding,  Sterne,  and  Smollett 
were  given  to  the  world,  and  determined  the 
nature  of  the  English  novel.  The  plot  of  most 
of  their  fifteen  realistic  novels  is  practically  the 
same.  The  hero  falls  in  love  with  a  beautiful 
young  lady,  not  over  seventeen,  and  there  is  a 
conflict  between  lust  and  chastity.  The  hero, 
balked  of  his  prey,  travels  up  and  down  the 
world,  where  he  meets  with  a  series  of  adven- 
tures, all  very  much  alike,  and  all  bearing  very 
little  on  the  main  plot.  At  last  fate  leads  the 
24 


Sarah  Fielding  25 

dashing  hero  to  the  church  door,  where  he  con- 
fers a  ring  on  the  fair  heroine,  a  paltry  piece  of 
gold,  the  only  reward  for  her  fidelity,  with  the 
hero  thrown  in,  much  the  worse  for  wear,  and 
the  curtain  falls  with  the  sound  of  the  wedding 
bells  in  the  distance. 

The  range  of  these  novels  is  narrow.  They 
describe  a  world  in  which  the  chief  occupation 
is  eating,  drinking,  swearing,  gambling,  and 
fighting.  Their  chief  artistic  excellence  is  the 
strength  and  vigour  with  which  these  low  scenes 
are  described.  Sidney  Lanier  says  of  them: 
"They  play  upon  life  as  upon  a  violin  without 
a  bridge,  in  the  deliberate  endeavour  to  get  the 
most  depressing  tones  possible  from  the  instru- 
ment." And  Taine,  who  could  hardly  endure 
any  of  them,  writes  of  Fielding  what  he  implies 
of  the  others :  ' '  One  thing  is  wanted  in  your 
strongly-built  folks — refinement;  the  delicate 
dreams,  enthusiastic  elevation,  and  trembling 
delicacy  exist  in  nature  equally  with  coarse 
vigour,  noisy  hilarity,  and  frank  kindness." 

The  women  who  essayed  the  art  of  fiction  dur- 
ing these  years  did  not  have  so  firm  a  grasp  of 
the  pen  as  their  male  contemporaries,  and  they 
have  added  no  portraits  to  the  gallery  of  fiction ; 
but  they  saw  and  recorded  many  interest- 
ing scenes  of  British  life  which  quite  escaped 
the  quick-sighted  Fielding,  or  Sterne  with  the 
microscopic  eyes. 


26      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

In  1744,  when  Richardson  had  written  only  one 
book,  and  Fielding  had  published  only  two,  before 
Tom  Jones  or  Clarissa  Harlowe  had  seen  the  light 
of  day,  Sarah  Fielding  published  David  Simple, 
under  the  title  of  The  Adventures  of  David  Simple, 
containing  an  account  of  his  travels  through  the 
cities  of  London  and  Westminster  in  the  search  of 
a  real  friend,  by  a  Lady.  The  author  commenced 
the  story  as  a  satire  on  society.  For  a  long  time 
David's  search  is  unsuccessful.  Although  he 
changed  his  lodgings  every  week,  he  could  hear 
of  no  one  who  could  be  trusted.  Many,  to  be  sure, 
dropped  hints  of  their  own  excellence,  and  the 
pity  that  they  had  to  live  with  inferior  neigh- 
bours. Among  these  was  Mr.  Spatter,  who  intro- 
duced him  to  Mr.  Varnish.  The  former  saw  the 
faults  of  people  through  a  magnifying  glass; 
while  the  latter,  when  he  mentioned  a  person's 
failings,  added,  "He  was  sure  they  had  some 
good  in  them."  But  David  soon  learned  that 
Mr.  Varnish  was  no  readier  to  assist  a  friend  in 
need  than  the  fault-finding  Mr.  Spatter. 

Like  her  brother  Henry,  Sarah  Fielding  is 
often  sarcastic.  In  one  of  the  chapters  she 
leaves  David  to  his  sufferings,  ''lest  it  should 
be  thought,"  she  added,  "I  am  so  ignorant 
of  the  world  as  not  to  know  the  proper  time  of 
forsaking  people."  But  the  pessimistic  vein  of 
the  first  volume  changes  to  a  more  optimistic 
tone  in  the  second.  David,  in  his  search  for 


Sarah  Fielding  27 

one  friend,  finds  three.  Fortunately  these  con- 
sist of  a  brother  and  sister  and  a  lady  in  love 
with  the  brother.  Even  at  this  early  time,  an 
author  had  no  doubts  as  to  how  a  novel  should 
end.  The  heading  of  the  last  chapter  in  the 
book  informs  us  that  it  contains  two  wed- 
dings, "and  consequently  the  Conclusion  of  the 
Book." 

In  its  construction,  the  plot  is  similar  to  that 
of  the  other  novels  of  the  period.  David  has 
plenty  of  time  at  his  disposal,  and  listens  with 
more  patience  than  the  reader  to  the  detailed 
history  of  all  the  people  he  meets,  and  often 
begs  a  casual  acquaintance  to  favour  him  with 
the  story  of  his  life. 

But  Sarah  Fielding's  chief  charm  to  her  women 
readers  is  the  feminine  view  of  her  times.  In 
David  Simple  we  have  the  pleasure  of  travel- 
ling through  England,  but  with  a  woman  as  our 
guide.  As  Harry  Fielding  travelled  between 
Bath  and  London,  the  fair  reader  wonders  what 
he  reported  to  Mrs.  Fielding  of  what  he  had  seen 
and  heard.  Surely  at  these  various  inns  there 
must  have  been  some  by-play  of  real  affection, 
some  act  of  modest  kindness,  some  incident  of 
delicate  humour.  Did  he  regale  Mrs.  Fielding 
with  the  scenes  he  has  described  for  his  readers? 
Probably  when  she  asked  him  if  anything  had 
happened  en  route,  he  merely  yawned  and  replied, 
"Oh,  nothing  worth  while."  He  had  too  much 


28      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

reverence  for  his  wife  to  repeat  these  low  scenes 
to  her,  and  we  suspect  he  had  eyes  for  no  others. 
What  would  Addison  or  Steele  have  seen  in  the 
same  place? 

Sarah  Fielding  also  takes  her  characters  on  a 
stage-coach  journey,  but  here  we  sit  beside  the 
fair  heroine,  an  intelligent  lady,  and  gaze  at  the 
men  who  sit  opposite  her.  There  is  the  Butter- 
fly with  his  hair  pinned  up  in  blue  papers,  wearing 
a  laced  waistcoat,  and  humming  an  Italian  air. 
He  admires  nothing  but  the  ladies,  and  offered 
some  little  familiarity  to  our  heroine,  which 
she  repulsed;  upon  this  he  paid  her  the  great- 
est respect  imaginable,  being  convinced,  as  she 
would  not  suffer  any  intimacy  from  him,  she 
must  be  one  of  the  most  virtuous  women  that 
had  ever  been  born.  There  is  the  Atheist,  who 
being  alone  with  her  for  a  few  moments  makes 
love  to  her  in  an  insinuating  manner,  and  tries 
to  prove  to  her  that  pleasure  is  the  only  thing  to 
be  sought  in  life,  and  assures  her  that  she  may 
follow  her  inclinations  without  a  crime,  "while 
she  knew  that  nothing  could  so  much  oppose  her 
gratifying  him,  as  her  pleasing  herself."  Then 
there  is  the  Clergyman  who  makes  honourable 
love  to  her,  but  by  doing  so  puts  an  end  to  the 
friendship  which  she  had  hoped  might  be  be- 
tween them ;  until  at  the  end  of  the  journey, ' '  she 
almost  made  a  resolution  never  to  speak  to  a 
man  again,  beginning  to  think  it  impossible  for 


Sarah  Fielding  29 

a  man  to  be  civil  to  a  woman,  unless  he  had 
some  designs  upon  her." 

Whether  or  not  women  have  ever  portrayed  the 
masculine  sex  truthfully  is  an  open  question. 
But  a  gentleman  mellowed  and  softened  in  the 
light  of  ladies'  smiles  is  quite  a  different  creature 
from  the  same  gentleman  when  seen  among 
the  sterner  members  of  his  own  sex,  and  there 
are  certain  phases  of  men's  characters  portrayed 
in  the  novels  of  women  which  Fielding,  Scott, 
and  Thackeray  seem  never  to  have  seen. 

Miss  Fielding  descants  upon  many  familiar 
scenes  in  a  manner  that  would  have  made  her  a 
valuable  contributor  to  the  Tatler  or  Spectator. 
All  kinds  of  human  nature  interested  her.  There 
is  the  man  who  advises  David  as  a  friend  to  buy  a 
certain  stock  which  he  himself  is  secretly  trying 
to  sell  because  he  knows  it  has  decreased  in  value, 
thus  showing  that  money  transactions  in  London 
in  the  reigns  of  the  Georges  differed  little  from 
money  transactions  on  the  Stock  Exchange 
to-day.  In  some  respects,  however,  society  has 
improved  since  the  days  of  Sarah  Fielding.  She 
describes  the  gentlemen  of  social  prominence 
who  tumble  up  to  the  carriages  of  ladies  who 
are  driving  through  Covent  Garden  in  the 
morning,  and  present  them  with  cabbages  or 
other  vegetables  which  they  have  picked  up 
from  the  stalls,  too  intoxicated  to  know  that 
their  conduct  is  ridiculous.  There  are  the 


30      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

crowds  at  the  theatres  who  show  their  displeas- 
ure with  a  playwright  by  making  so  much  noise 
that  his  play  cannot  be  heard  on  its  first  night 
and  so  is  condemned.  Other  writers  of  the 
period  complain  of  having  received  this  kind  of 
treatment  at  the  hands  of  the  gentlemen  mob. 
And  then  we  are  introduced  to  a  scene  in  the 
fashionable  "West  End  which  is  a  familiar  one 
to-day,  where  the  ladies  of  quality  have  their 
whist  assemblies  and  spend  all  the  morning 
visiting  each  other  and  discussing  how  the 
cards  were  played  the  previous  evening  and 
why  certain  tricks  were  lost. 

We  recognise  the  fact,  however,  that  Miss 
Fielding's  knowledge  of  life  was  but  slight. 
She  writes  from  the  standpoint  of  a  spectator,  not 
like  her  brother  as  one  who  had  been  a  part  of  it. 
She  was  one  of  that  group  of  gentlewomen 
who  gathered  around  Richardson  and  heard  him 
read  Clarissa,  or  discussed  life  and  books  with 
him  at  the  breakfast  table  in  the  summer-house 
at  North  End,  Hammersmith.  Life  was  not 
lived  there,  but  philosophy  often  sat  at  the 
board,  and  there  was  fine  penetration  into  the 
characters  and  manners  of  men.  Richardson 
transferred  to  Miss  Fielding  the  compliment 
which  Dr.  Johnson  had  bestowed  upon  him,  and 
it  was  not  undeserved  by  the  author  of  David 
Simple: 

"What  a  knowledge  of  the  human   heart! 


Mrs.  Lennox  31 

Well  might  a  critical  judge  of  writing  say,  as  he 
did  to  me,  that  your  late  brother's  knowledge 
of  it  was  not  (fine  writer  as  he  was)  comparable 
to  yours.  His  was  but  as  the  knowledge  of  the 
outside  of  a  clock-work  machine,  while  yours 
was  that  of  all  the  finer  springs  and  movements 
of  the  inside." 

It  is  not  difficult  to  conjure  up  a  picture  of  the 
literary  gentlemen  and  gentlewomen  who  used 
to  breakfast  with  Richardson  in  the  summer- 
house  at  North  End;  the  gentlemen  in  their 
many-coloured  velvet  suits,  the  ladies  wearing 
broad  hoops,  loose  sacques,  and  Pamela  hats. 
One  of  these  ladies  was  Charlotte  Ramsay, 
better  known  by  her  married  name  of  Mrs. 
Lennox.  Her  father,  Colonel  James  Ramsay, 
was  lieutenant-governor  of  New  York,  where 
his  daughter  Charlotte  was  born  in  1720.  She 
was  sent  to  England  at  the  age  of  fifteen,  and 
soon  after  her  father  died,  leaving  her  unprovided 
for.  She  turned  her  attention  to  literature  as  a 
means  of  livelihood,  and  at  once  became  a 
favourite  in  the  literary  circles  of  London,  where 
she  met  and  won  the  esteem  of  the  great  Dr. 
Johnson. 

When  her  first  novel,  The  Life  of  Harriet 
Stuart,  was  published,  he  showed  his  apprecia- 
tion of  its  author  in  a  unique  manner.  At  his 
suggestion,  the  Ivy  Lane  Club  and  its  friends 


32      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

entertained  Mrs.  Lennox  and  her  husband  at 
the  Devil's  Tavern  with  a  night  of  festivity. 
After  an  elaborate  supper  had  been  served,  a 
hot  apple-pie  was  brought  in,  stuffed  full  of 
bay-leaves,  and  Johnson  with  appropriate  cer- 
emonies crowned  the  author  with  a  wreath 
of  laurel.  The  night  was  passed  in  mirth  and 
conversation ;  tea  and  coffee  were  often  served ; 
and  not  until  the  creaking  of  the  street  doors 
reminded  them  that  it  was  eight  o'clock  in  the 
morning  did  the  guests,  twenty  in  number,  leave 
the  tavern. 

Mrs.  Lennox's  claim  to  a  place  in  English 
literature  rests  solely  upon  her  novel,  The 
Female  Quixote,  published  in  1752.  Arabella, 
the  heroine,  is  the  daughter  of  a  marquis  who 
has  retired  into  the  country,  where  he  lives 
remote  from  society.  Her  mother  is  dead;  her 
father  is  immersed  in  his  books,  so  that  Arabella 
is  left  alone,  and  whiles  away  the  hours  by 
reading  the  novels  of  Mademoiselle  de  Scud£ri. 
Her  three  great  novels,  Clelia,  Tlie  Gravid 
Cyrus  and  Ibrahim,  are  historical  allegories, 
in  which  the  France  of  Louis  XIV  is  given  an 
historical  setting,  and  his  courtiers  masquerade 
under  the  names  of  famous  men  of  antiquity. 
There  is  no  attempt  at  historical  accuracy. 
But  to  Arabella  these  books  represented  true 
history  and  depicted  the  real  life  of  the  world. 

In  a  fine  satirical  passage  Arabella  informs 


Mrs,  Lennox  33 

Mr.  Selvin,  a  man  so  deeply  read  in  ancient 
history  that  he  fixed  the  date  of  any  occurrence 
by  Olympiads,  not  years,  that  Pisistratus  had 
been  inspired  to  enslave  his  country  because  of 
his  love  for  Cleorante.  Mr.  Selvin  wonders 
how  this  important  fact  could  have  escaped  his 
own  research,  and  conceives  a  great  admiration 
for  Arabella's  learning. 

In  the  novels  of  Mademoiselle  de  Scude'ri  the 
characters,  even  in  moments  of  extreme  danger, 
entertain  each  other  with  stories  of  their  past 
experiences.  When  Arabella  has  unexpected 
guests  she  bids  her  maid  relate  to  them  the  his- 
tory of  her  mistress.  She  instructs  her  to  "re- 
late exactly  every  change  of  my  countenance, 
number  all  my  smiles,  half-smiles,  blushes,  turn- 
ings pale,  glances,  pauses,  full-stops,  interrup- 
tions; the  rise  and  falling  of  my  voice,  every 
motion  of  my  eyes,  and  every  gesture  which  I 
have  used  for  these  ten  years  past:  nor  omit 
the  smallest  circumstance  that  relates  to  me." 

All  the  people  Arabella  meets  are  changed  by 
her  fancy  into  the  characters  of  her  favourite 
books.  In  common  people  she  sees  princes  in 
disguise.  If  a  man  approaches  her,  she  fancies 
that  he  is  about  to  bear  her  away  to  some  re- 
mote castle,  or  to  mention  the  subject  of  love, 
which  would  be  unpardonable,  unless  he  had 
first  captured  cities  in  her  behalf.  Yet  amid  the 
wildest  extravagances  Arabella  never  loses  her 

3 


34      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

charm.  Her  generosity  and  purity  of  thought 
make  her  a  very  lovable  heroine,  much  more 
womanly  than  Clarissa  or  Sophia  Western,  and 
we  do  not  wonder  that  Mr.  Glanville  continues 
to  love  her,  although  he  is  so  often  annoyed  by 
her  ridiculous  fancies. 

But  her  belief  in  her  hallucinations  is  as  firm 
as  that  of  the  Spanish  Quixote  for  whom  the 
book  was  named.  Everyone  will  remember 
his  attack  on  the  windmills,  which  he  mistook 
for  giants.  Arabella  was  equally  brave.  Think- 
ing herself  and  some  other  ladies  pursued,  when 
the  Thames  cuts  off  their  escape,  she  addresses 
her  companions  in  language  becoming  one  of 
her  favourite  heroines:  "Once  more,  my  fair 
Companions,  if  your  honour  be  dear  to  you,  if 
an  immortal  glory  be  worth  your  seeking, 
follow  the  example  I  shall  set  you,  and  equal,  with 
me,  the  Roman  Clelia."  She  plunged  into  the 
river,  but  was  promptly  rescued.  The  doctor 
who  attended  her  in  the  illness  that  followed 
this  heroic  deed  convinced  her  of  the  folly  of 
trying  to  live  according  to  these  old  books, 
and  she  consented  to  marry  her  faithful  and 
deserving  lover. 

The  character  of  Arabella  is  not  drawn  with 
the  broad  strong  lines  of  Fielding,  nor  with  the 
attention  to  minute  detail  which  gives  life  to  the 
characters  of  Richardson.  But  the  girlish  sweet- 
ness of  Arabella,  her  refusal  to  believe  wrong  of 


Mrs.  Lennox 


35 


others,  her  ignorance  of  life,  her  contempt  for 
a  lover  who  has  not  shed  blood  nor  captured 
cities  in  her  behalf,  is  a  reality,  and  shows  that 
the  author  knew  the  nature  of  the  romantic 
girl.  In  the  noble  simplicity  of  Arabella,  Mrs. 
Lennox  has,  perhaps  unconsciously,  paid  a  high 
tribute  to  the  moral  effects  of  the  novels  of 
Scud^ri.  Arabella  is  the  only  clearly  drawn 
character  in  the  book.  But  one  humorous 
situation  follows  another,  so  that  the  interest 
never  flags. 

The  other  novels  of  Mrs.  Lennox  have  no 
value  save  as  they  show  the  trend  of  thought 
of  the  period.  In  Henrietta,  afterward  dra- 
matised as  The  Sister,  the  heroine,  grand- 
daughter of  an  earl,  rather  than  change  her 
religion,  leaves  her  family  and  becomes  the 
maid  of  a  rich  but  vulgar  tradesman's  daughter. 
Of  course  her  mistress,  who  has  treated  her 
scurrilously,  in  time  learns  her  true  rank  and  is 
properly  humbled.  The  name  given  to  one  of  the 
chapters  might  suffice  for  the  most  of  them: 
"In  which  our  heroine  is  in  great  distress." 

This  would  seem  to  be  the  proper  heading 
for  many  chapters  of  many  books  of  the  period. 
In  the  days  of  Good  Queen  Bess,  heroines  were 
good  and  happy.  In  the  merry  reign  of  Charles, 
they  were  bad  but  happy.  Pamela  set  a 
fashion  from  which  heroines  seldom  dared  to 
deviate  for  over  a  hundred  years.  They  were 


36      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

good  —  but,  oh,  so  wretched!  This  type  of 
women  became  such  a  favourite  with  both 
sexes,  that  even  the  sane-minded  Scott  says: 

And  love  is  loveliest  when  embalmed  in  tears. 

During  her  period  of  distress  Henrietta 
lodged  with  a  milliner.  Her  landlady  showed 
her  a  small  collection  of  books  and  pointed  with 
especial  pleasure  to  her  favourite  novels: 
*'  There  is  Mrs.  Haywood's  Novels,  did  you 
ever  read  them?  Oh!  they  are  the  finest  love- 
sick passionate  stories:  I  assure  you,  you'll 
like  them  vastly."  Henrietta,  however,  chose 
Joseph  Andrews  for  her  diversion.  Mrs.  Eliza 
Hay  wood  was  never  admitted  into  that  inner 
circle  of  highly  respectable  English  ladies  who 
clustered  around  Richardson.  She  was  more 
of  an  adventuress  in  the  domain  of  letters. 
In  her  first  novels  she  followed  the  fashion  set 
by  Mrs.  Manley  and  supplied  the  public  with 
scandals  in  high  life.  Memoirs  of  a  Certain 
Island  Adjacent  to  Utopia,  published  in  1725, 
The  Secret  Intrigues  of  the  Count  of  Caramania, 
published  in  1727,  are  the  highly  suggestive  titles 
of  two  of  the  most  popular  of  her  early  works. 

After  Richardson  had  made  Virtue  more  popu- 
lar than  Vice,  Mrs.  Haywood  followed  the  liter- 
ary fashion  which  he  had  set,  and  in  1751 
wrote  The  History  of  Miss  Betsey  Thoughtless. 
This  has  sometimes  been  called  a  domestic  novel. 


Mrs.  Hay  wood  37 

but  that  is  a  misnomer,  since  the  characters 
are  seldom  found  at  home,  but  rather  are  met 
in  the  various  pleasure  resorts  of  London.  As 
was  the  fashion  in  the  novels  of  this  time,  and 
probably  not  an  uncommon  occurrence  in  the 
English  capital,  the  heroine  was  often  forced 
into  a  chariot  by  some  lawless  libertine,  but 
fortunately  was  always  rescued  by  some  more 
virtuous  lover.  The  whole  story  is  but  a  new 
arrangement  of  the  one  or  two  incidents  with 
which  Richardson  had  wrung  the  heart  of  the 
British  public.  It  has  one  advantage  over  the 
most  of  the  novels  which  had  preceded  it. 
There  is  little  told  that  does  not  bear  directly  on 
the  plot,  the  characters  of  the  sub-plot  being 
important  personages  in  the  main  story,  and  the 
book  has  a  definite  conclusion. 

None  of  the  characters,  however,  are  pleasing. 
The  hero,  Mr.  True  worthy,  a  combination  of 
Tom  Jones  and  Sir  Charles  Grandison,  is  a 
hypocrite.  The  other  male  characters  are  insig- 
nificant. Miss  Betsey,  the  heroine,  is  almost 
charming.  Conscious  of  her  own  innocence,  she 
repeatedly  appears  in  a  light  that  makes  her 
worldly  lover,  Mr.  Trueworthy,  suspect  her 
virtue,  until  at  last  he  begs  to  be  released  from 
his  engagement  to  her.  The  author  of  the  book 
stands  as  a  duenna  at  Miss  Betsey's  side,  and 
points  out  by  the  misfortunes  of  the  heroine 
how  foolish  it  is  for  girls  to  ignore  public  opinion, 


38      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

and  strives  to  inculcate  the  lesson  that  a  husband 
is  the  best  protection  for  a  young  girl.  We  are 
properly  shocked  at  Miss  Betsey's  levity,  who, 
although  she  had  arrived  at  the  mature  age 
of  fourteen,  cared  not  a  straw  for  any  of  the 
gentlemen  who  sought  her  hand,  but  liked  to 
have  them  about  her  only  because  they  flattered 
her  vanity  or  afforded  her  a  subject  for  mirth. 
Miss  Betsey's  gaiety,  wit,  and  generosity  would 
be  very  attractive  —  in  fact,  she  is  quite  an  up- 
to-date  young  lady — but  we  see  how  much  bet- 
ter she  would  "get  on"  if  she  had  a  little  more 
worldly  wisdom.  She  is  punished,  as  she  deserves 
to  be,  by  losing  her  lover,  and  marries  a  man 
who  makes  her  very  unhappy.  Mr.  Trueworthy, 
however,  learns  of  her  innocence;  her  hus- 
band fortunately  dies,  and  the  author  takes 
the  bold  step  of  uniting  the  widow  to  her 
former  lover,  after  a  year  of  mourning  and 
passing  through  much  suffering,  brought  upon 
herself  by  her  own  thoughtlessness.  She  is  re- 
warded, however,  very  much  as  Pamela  was 
rewarded,  by  marrying  a  man  of  honour,  who 
had  judged  her  formerly  by  his  own  conduct, 
being  too  willing  to  believe  by  appearances  that 
she  had  lost  her  chastity,  or,  at  least,  had  sullied 
her  good  name. 

In  this  novel,  Mrs.  Haywood  is  very  near  the 
line  that  divides  the  artist  from  the  artisan. 
Like  a  young  girl  with  good  health  and  good 


Mrs.  Sheridan  39 

spirits,  Miss  Betsey  is  ever  on  the  verge  of 
sweeping  aside  the  prejudices  of  her  duenna,  and 
asserting  her  own  individuality,  but  is  constantly 
held  back  by  the  sense  of  worldly  propriety. 
Had  Mrs.  Haywood  permitted  Miss  Betsey  to 
carry  the  plot  whither  she  would  without  let  or 
hindrance,  she  would  have  won  for  herself  an 
acknowledged  place  among  the  heroines  of 
fiction. 

The  History  of  Miss  Betsey  Thoughtless  was 
an  epoch-making  book.  The  adventures  of  its 
heroine  in  the  city  of  London  took  possession  of 
the  imagination  of  Fanny  Burney,  while  little 
more  than  a  child,  and  led  to  the  story  of  Evelina, 
the  forerunner  of  Jane  Austen  and  her  school. 

The  fashion  for  weeping  heroines  was  at  its 
height,  when,  in  1761,  Mrs.  Francis  Sheridan 
published  The  Memoirs  of  Miss  Sidney  Biddulph. 
The  story  is  written  in  the  form  of  letters,  in 
which  the  heroine  reveals  to  a  friend  of  her 
own  sex  all  the  secrets  of  her  heart.  All  Lon- 
don rejoiced  over  the  virtues  of  Sidney  Bid- 
dulph, and  wept  over  her  sorrows.  She  had 
been  educated  "in  the  strictest  principles  of 
virtue ;  from  which  she  never  deviated,  through 
the  course  of  an  innocent,  though  unhappy 
life."  It  was  so  pathetic  a  story  that  Dr. 
Johnson  doubted  if  Mrs.  Sheridan  had  a  right 
to  make  her  characters  suffer  so  much,  and 


40      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Charles  James  Fox,  who  sat  up  all  night  to  read 
it,  pronounced  it  the  best  of  all  novels  of  his 
time. 

The  book,  as  first  written,  was  in  three  volumes. 
The  author  had  brought  the  story  to  a  most 
fitting  close.  Both  Sidney's  husband  and  the 
man  whom  she  had  really  loved  were  dead,  and 
the  widow  could  have  spent  her  days  in  pleasing 
melancholy,  contented  with  the  thought  that 
she  had  never  done  a  wrong.  But  the  public 
demanded  a  continuation  of  the  story.  In 
1767,  two  volumes  were  added,  giving  the  his- 
tory of  Sidney's  daughters,  who  seem  to  have 
inherited  from  their  mother  the  enmity  of 
the  fates,  for  their  sufferings  were  as  great  as 
hers. 

Authors  are  prone  to  draw  upon  their  own 
history  for  the  emotions  they  depict.  But  Mrs. 
Sheridan's  life  did  not  furnish  the  tragic  ele- 
ments of  Sidney  Biddulph,  although  it  was  not 
without  romance.  Before  her  marriage,  she 
wrote  a  pamphlet  in  praise  of  the  conduct  of  one 
Thomas  Sheridan,  the  manager  of  the  Theatre 
Royal  in  Dublin,  during  a  riot  that  occurred  in 
the  theatre.  Sheridan  read  these  words  in  his 
praise,  sought  the  acquaintance  of  their  author, 
and  before  long  married  her. 

History  furnishes  a  long  list  of  women  of  talent 
whose  sons  were  men  of  genius.  Mrs.  Sheridan's 
second  son,  Richard  Brinsley,  the  author  of  the 


Mrs.  Sheridan  41 

light  and  sparkling  Rivals,  inherited  his  mother's 
talents  without  her  gloom.  But  Mrs.  Sheridan 
also  had  some  ability  as  a  writer  of  comedy, 
and  the  most  famous  character  of  the  Rivals 
was  first  sketched  by  her.  In  a  comedy,  A 
Journey  to  Bath,  declined  by  Garrick,  one  of 
the  characters  was  Mrs.  Twyford,  whom  Richard 
Brinsley  Sheridan  transformed  into  that  famous 
blundering  coiner  of  words,  Mrs.  Malaprop. 

Mrs.  Sheridan's  place  in  literature  rests  upon 
Sidney  Biddulph.  This  novel  was  an  innovation 
in  English  fiction.  Nearly  one  hundred  years 
earlier,  Madame  de  Lafayette  had  written  The 
Princess  of  Cleves,  one  of  the  most  nearly  perfect 
novels  that  has  ever  been  written,  and  the  first 
that  depended  for  its  interest,  not  alone  on 
what  was  done,  but  on  the  subtle  workings  of 
the  human  heart  which  led  to  the  doing  of  it. 
From  that  time  the  novels  of  French  women 
were  largely  introspective.  English  women, 
however,  were  either  less  interested  in  the 
inner  life,  or  more  reserved  in  laying  bare  its 
secrets.  Sidney  Biddulph  was  the  first  Eng- 
lish novel  of  this  kind,  and  it  left  no  definite 
trace  on  fiction,  although  it  was  the  favourite 
novel  of  Charlotte  Smith  and  had  some  slight 
effect  upon  her  writings,  and  Mrs.  Inchbald, 
Mrs.  Opie,  and  Mary  Brunton  noted  the  feelings 
of  their  characters.  Not  until  Jane  Eyre  was 
published,  long  after  Mrs.  Sheridan  had  been 


42      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

forgotten,  was  there  any  great  English  novel 
of  the  inner  life. 

In  its  day  Sidney  Biddulph  was  exceedingly 
popular  on  the  continent  of  Europe  as  well 
as  in  England.  It  was  translated  into  German, 
and  an  adaptation  of  it  was  made  in  French  by 
the  Abbe  Prevost,  under  the  title,  Memoirs  pour 
servir  a  Vhistoire  de  la  vertu.  But  after  all, 
Sidney's  sorrows  were  not  real,  or  she  herself 
was  not  real;  and  we  of  to-day  smile  or  yawn 
over  the  pages  that  drew  tears  from  the  eyes  of 
the  mighty  Dr.  Johnson. 

Notwithstanding  the  many  excellencies  of  Eng- 
lish fiction  during  the  middle  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  it  was  held  in  low  repute.  There 
had  been  many  writers  attempting  to  portray 
real  life  who,  without  the  genius  of  the  greater 
novelists,  could  imitate  only  their  faults.  In 
the  preface  to  Polly  Honeycomb,  which  was 
acted  at  Drury  Lane  theatre  in  1760,  George 
Colman,  the  author,  gives  the  titles  of  about  two 
hundred  novels  whose  names  appeared  in  a  cir- 
culating library  at  that  time.  Amorous  Friars, 
or  the  Intrigues  of  a  Convent;  Beauty  put  to  its 
Shifts,  or  the  Young  Virgin's  Rambles;  Bubbled 
Knights,  or  Successful  Contrivances,  plainly  evinc- 
ing, in  two  Familiar  Instances  lately  transacted 
in  this  Metropolis,  the  Folly  and  Unreasonableness 
of  Parents  Laying  a  Restraint  upon  their  Chil- 


Mrs.  Sheridan  43 

dreris  Inclinations  in  the  Affairs  of  Love  and 
Marriage;  The  Impetuous  Lover,  or  the  Guiltless 
Parricide;  these  are  the  titles  of  a  few  of  the 
popular  books  of  that  period.  Colman  in  the 
character  of  Polly  Honeycomb,  an  earlier  Lydia 
Languish,  attempts  to  show  the  moral  effects  of 
such  reading.  Her  head  had  been  so  turned  by 
these  books  that  her  father  exclaims,  "A  man 
might  as  well  turn  his  daughter  loose  in  Covent- 
Garden,  as  trust  the  cultivation  of  her  mind  to 

A  CIRCULATING  LIBRARY." 

Fiction  at  this  time  lacked  delicacy  and 
refinement.  The  characters  lived  largely  in  the 
streets  or  taverns,  and  were  too  much  engrossed 
in  the  pleasures  of  active  life  to  give  any  heed  to 
thoughts  or  emotions.  Though  love  was  the 
constant  theme  of  these  books,  as  yet  no  true  love 
story  had  been  written.  The  fires  of  home  had 
not  been  lighted.  The  refinements,  the  pure  af- 
fections, the  high  ideals  which  cluster  around 
the  domestic  hearth  had  as  yet  no  place  in  the 
novel.  It  needed  the  feminine  element,  which, 
while  no  broader  than  that  which  had  pre- 
viously made  the  novel,  by  its  own  addition 
gave  something  new  to  it  and  made  it  truer  to 
life. 

While  no  woman  of  marked  genius  had  ap- 
peared, the  number  and  influence  of  women 
novelists  continued  to  increase  throughout  the 
eighteenth  century.  Tim  Cropdale  in  the  novel 


44      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Humphry  Clinker,  who  "had  made  shift  to 
live  many  years  by  writing  novels,  at  the 
rate  of  five  pounds  a  volume,"  complains  that 
"that  branch  of  business  is  now  engrossed  by 
female  authors,  who  publish  merely  for  the  pro- 
pagation of  virtue,  with  so  much  ease,  and  spirit, 
and  delicacy,  and  knowledge  of  the  human 
heart,  and  all  in  the  serene  tranquillity  of  high 
life,  that  the  reader  is  not  only  enchanted  by 
their  genius,  but  reformed  by  their  morality." 
Schlosser  in  his  History  of  the  Eighteenth  Century 
pays  this  tribute  to  the  moral  influence  of  the 
women  novelists:  "With  the  increase  of  the 
number  of  writers  in  England  in  the  course  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  women  began  to  appear 
as  authors  instead  of  educating  their  children, 
and  their  influence  upon  morals  and  modes 
of  thinking  increased,  as  that  of  the  clergy 
diminished." 


CHAPTER  III 

Fanny  Burney 

A  NOTEWORTHY  transformation  took  place 
in  the  English  novel  during  the  late  years 
of  the  eighteenth  century  and  the  early  part  of 
the  nineteenth.  This  change  cannot  be  explained 
by  the  great  difference  in  manners  only.  The 
mode  of  life  described  by  the  early  novelists  was 
in  existence  sixty  years  after  they  wrote  scenes 
typical  of  the  customs  and  manners  of  their 
day,  just  as  the  quiet  home  life  described  by 
Miss  Austen  was  to  be  found  in  England  a 
hundred  years  before  it  graced  the  pages  of  a 
book.  This  new  era  in  the  English  novel  was 
due  not  to  a  change  of  environment,  but  to  the 
new  ideals  of  those  who  wrote. 

In  1778,  English  fiction  was  represented  by 
the  work  of  Miss  Burney,  and  for  thirty-six 
years,  until  1814,  when  Waverley  appeared,  this 
rare  plant  was  preserved  and  kept  alive  by  a 
group  of  womenTwho  trimmed  and  pruned  off 
many  of  its  rough  branches  and  gave  to  the 
wild  native  fruit  a  delicacy  and  fragrance  un- 
known to  it  before.  English  women  writers  did 
45 


46      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

at  that  time  for  the  English  novel  what  French 
women  had  done  in  the  preceding  century  for 
the  French  novel;  they  made  it  so  pure  in 
thought  and  expression  that  Bishop  Huet  was 
able  to  say  of  the  French  romances  of  the  seven- 
teenth century, ' '  You  '11  scarce  find  an  expression 
or  word  which  may  shock  chaste  ears,  or  one 
single  action  which  may  give  offence  to  modesty." 
This  great  change  in  the  English  novel  was 
inaugurated  by  a  young  woman  ignorant  of  the 
world,  whose  power  lay  in  her  innocent  and 
lively  imagination.  At  his  home  in  Queen 
Square  and  later  in  St.  Martin's  Street,  Charles 
Burney,  the  father  of  Frances,  entertained  the 
most  illustrious  men  of  his  day.  Johnson, 
Reynolds,  Garrick,  Burke,  and  Colman  were 
frequent  guests,  while  members  of  the  nobility 
thronged  his  parlours  to  listen  to  the  famous 
Italian  singers  who  gladly  sang  for  the  author  of 
the  History  of  Music.  Here  Fanny,  a  bashful 
but  observant  child,  saw  life  in  the  drawjnj*- 
4^om.  But  as  Dr.  Burney  "gave'TifEle  Keed  to 
the  comings  and  goings  of  his  daughters,  they 
played  with  the  children  of  a  wigmaker  next 
door,  where,  perhaps,  Fanny  became  acquainted 
with  the  vulgar  side  of  London  life,  which  is  so 
humorously  depicted  in  Evelina.  She  received 
but  little  education,  nor  was  she  more  than  a 
casual  reader,  but  she  was  familar  with  Pamela, 
Betsey  Thoughtless,  Rasselas,  and  the  Vicar  of 


Fanny  Burney  47 

Wakefield.  Such  was  her  preparation  for  becom- 
ing a  writer  of  novels. 

From  her  earliest  years,  she  had  delighted 
in  writing  stories  and  dramas,  although  she 
received  little  encouragement  in  this  occupa- 
tion. In  her  fifteenth  year  her  step-mother 
proved  to  her  so  conclusively  the  folly  of 
girls'  scribbling  that  Fanny  burned  all  her 
manuscripts,  including  The  History  of  Caroline 
Evelyn.  She  could  not,  however,  banish  from 
her  mind  the  fate  of  Caroline's  infant  daughter, 
born  of  high  rank,  but  related  through  her 
grandmother  to  the  vulgar  people  of  the  East 
End  of  London.  The  many  embarrassing  situa- 
tions in  which  she  might  be  placed  haunted  the 
imagination  of  the  youthful  writer,  but  it  was 
not  until  her  twenty-sixth  year  that  these  situa- 
tions were  described,  when  Evelina  or  a  Young 
Lady's  Entrance  into  the  World  was  published. 

The  success  of  the  book  was  instantaneous. 
The  name  of  the  author,  which  had  been  with- 
held even  from  the  publishers,  was  eagerly 
demanded.  All  agreed  that  only  a  man  con- 
versant with  the  world  could  have  written 
such  accurate  descriptions  of  life  both  high  and 
low.  The  wonder  was  increased  when  it  was 
learned  that  the  author  was  a  young  woman 
who  had  drawn  her  scenes,  not  from  a  knowledge 
of  the  world,  but  from  her  own  intuition  and 
imagination.  Miss  Burney  became  at  once 


48      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

an  honoured  member  of  the  literary  circle  which 
Mrs.  Thrale  had  gathered  at  Streatham,  and  a 
favourite  of  Dr.  Johnson,  who  declared  that 
Evelina  was  superior  to  anything  that  Field- 
ing had  written,  and  that  some  passages  were 
worthy  of  the  pen  of  Richardson.  The  book 
was  accorded  a  place  among  English  classics, 
which  it  has  retained  for  over  a  century.  "It 
was  not  hard  fagging  that  produced  such  a 
work  as  Evelina,"  wrote  Mr.  Crisp  to  the  youth- 
ful author.  ' '  It  was  the  ebullition  of  true  sterling 
genius — you  wrote  it  because  you  could  not  help 
it — it  came — and  so  you  put  it  down  on  paper." 

The  novel,  following  the  form  so  common 
in  the  eighteenth  century,  is  written  in  the  form 
of  letters.  The  plot  is  somewhat  time-honoured ; 
there  is  the  nurse's  daughter  substituted  for  the 
real  heiress,  and  a  mystery  surrounding  some 
of  the  characters;  it  is  unfolded  slowly  with 
a  slight  strain  upon  the  readers'  credulity  at 
the  last,  but  it  ends  to  the  satisfaction  of  all 
concerned.  In  many  incidents  and  in  some  of  the 
characters  the  story  suggests  Betsey  Thoughtless, 
but  Miss  Burney  had  greater  powers  of  descrip- 
tion than  Mrs.  Haywood. 

The  plot  of  the  novel  is  forgotten,  however,  in 

J:he  lively,  witty  manner  in  which  the  characters 

are  drawn  and  the  ludicrous  situations  in  which 

they  are  placed.     So  long  had  these  men  and 

women  held  the  mind  of  the  author  that  they  are 


Fanny  Burney  49 

intensely  real  as  they  are  presented  to  us  at 
assemblies,  balls,  theatres,  and  operas,  where  we 
watch  their  oddities  with  amusement. 

Indeed  no  woman  has  given  so  many  graphic, 
droll,  and  minute  descriptions  of  life  as  Miss 
Burney.  Her  genius  in  this  respect  is  different 
from  that  of  other  women  novelists.  She  has 
made  a  series  of  snap-shots  of  people  in  the  most 
absurd  situations  and  ridicules  them  while  she  is 
taking  the  picture.  Few  women  writers  can 
resist  the  temptation  of  peeping  into  the  hearts 
of  their  men  and  women,  and  the  knowledge 
thus  gained  gives  them  sympathy,  while  it  often 
detracts  from  the  strong  lines  of  the  external 
picture;  a  writer  will  not  paint  a  villain  quite 
so  black  if  he  believes  he  still  preserves  some 
remnants  of  a  noble  nature.  But  Miss  Burney 
has  no  interest  in  the  inner  life  of  her  men  and 
women.  She  saw  their  peculiarities  and  was 
amused  by  them,  and  has  presented  them  to  the 
reader  with  minute  descriptions  and  lively  wit. 

She  also  makes  fine  distinctions  between  peo- 
ple. Sir  Clement  Willoughby,  the  West  End 
.snob,  and  Mr.  Smith,  the  East  End  beau,  are 
drawn  with  discrimination.  With  what  wit 
Miss  Burney  describes  the  scene  at  the  ridotto 
between  Evelina  and  Sir  Clement.  He  had 
asked  her  to  dance  with  him.  Unwilling  to  do  so, 
because  she  wished  to  dance  with  another  gentle- 
man, if  he  should  ask  her,  she  told  Sir  Clement 


50      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

she  was  engaged  for  that  dance.  He  did  not 
leave  her,  however,  but  remained  by  her  side 
and  speculated  as  to  who  the  beast  was  so 
hostile  to  his  own  interests  as  to  forget  to  come 
to  her;  pitied  the  humiliation  a  lady  must  feel 
in  having  to  wait  for  a  gentleman,  and  pointed 
to  each  old  and  lame  man  in  the  room  asking 
if  he  were  the  miscreant;  he  offered  to  find  him 
for  her  and  asked  what  kind  of  a  coat  he  had  on. 
When  Evelina  did  not  know,  he  became  angry 
with  the  wretch  who  dared  to  address  a  lady 
in  so  insignificant  a  coat  that  it  was  unworthy 
of  her  notice.  To  save  herself  from  further 
annoyance  she  danced  with  him,  for  she  now 
knew  that  Sir  Clement  had  seen  through  her 
artifice  from  the  beginning. 

But  the  portrait  of  Mr.  Smith,  the  East  End 
snob,  is  even  better  than  that  of  Sir  Clement 
Willoughby.  Evelina  is  visiting  her  relatives 
at  Snow  Hill,  when  Mr.  Smith  enters,  self- 
confident  and  vulgar.  His  aim  in  life,  as  he 
tells  us,  is  to  please  the  ladies.  When  Tom 
Branghton  is  disputing  with  his  sister  about 
the  place  where  they  shall  go  for  amusement,  he 
reprimands  Tom  for  his  lack  of  good  breeding. 

"0  fie,  Tom,— dispute  with  a  lady!"  cried 
Mr.  Smith.  "Now,  as  for  me,  I  'm  for  where 
you  will,  providing  this  young  lady  [meaning 
Evelina]  is  of  the  party;  one  place  is  the  same 
as  another  to  me,  so  that  it  be  but  agreeable  to 


Fanny  Burney  51 

the  ladies.  I  would  go  anywhere  with  you, 
Ma'm,  unless,  indeed,  it  were  to  church; — ha,  ha, 
ha,  you  '11  excuse  me,  Ma'm,  but,  really,  I  never 
could  conquer  my  fear  of  a  parson; — ha,  ha,  ha, 
-  really,  ladies,  I  beg  your  pardon,  for  being 
so  rude,  but  I  can't  help  laughing  for  my  life." 

Mr.  Smith  endeavoured  to  make  himself 
particularly  pleasing  to  Evelina,  and  for  that 
purpose  bought  tickets  for  her  and  her  relatives 
to  attend  the  Hampstead  Assembly.  When  he 
observed  that  Evelina  was  a  little  out  of  sorts, 
he  attributed  her  low  spirits  to  doubts  of  his 
intentions  towards  her.  "To  be  sure,"  he  told 
her,  "marriage  is  all  in  all  with  the  ladies;  but 
with  us  gentlemen  it 's  quite  another  thing."  He 
advised  her  not  to  be  discouraged,  saying  with 
a  patronising  air,  "You  may  very  well  be  proud, 
for  I  assure  you  there  is  nobody  so  likely  to 
catch  me  at  last  as  yourself." 

Both  Sir  Clement  Willoughby  and  Mr.  Smith 
are  selfish  and  conceited;  but  the  former  had 
lived  among  the  gentlemen  of  Mayfair,  the 
latter  among  the  tradespeople  of  Snow  Hill,  and 
this  difference  of  environment  is  shown  in  every 
speech  they  utter. 

It  is  the  contrast  between  these  two  distinct 
classes  of  society  that  saves  the  book  from 
becoming  monotonous.  Evelina  visits  the  Pan- 
theon with  her  West  End  friends.  When  Cap- 
tain Mirvan  wonders  what  people  find  in  such 


52      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

a  place,  Mr.  Lovel,  a  fashionable  fop,  quickly 
rejoins:  "What  the  ladies  may  come  hither 
for,  Sir,  it  would  ill  become  us  to  determine; 
but  as  to  we  men,  doubtless  we  can  have  no 
other  view,  than  to  admire  them."  At  another 
time  Evelina  visits  the  opera  with  the  vulgar 
Branghtons,  who  all  rejoiced  when  the  curtain 
dropped,  and  Mr.  Branghton  vowed  he  would 
never  be  caught  again.  The  Branghtons  at  the 
opera  is  hardly  inferior  to  Partridge  at  the  play. 
Tom  Branghton  is  a  good  representative  of  his 
class.  He  describes  with  glee  the  last  night  at 
Vauxhall:  "There  's  such  squealing  and  squall- 
ing!— and  then  all  the  lamps  are  broke, — and 
the  women  skimper  scamper; — I  declare  I  would 
not  take  five  guineas  to  miss  the  last  night!" 

All  the  characters,  ev^n^he^eTom^takejde^ 
light  in  boisterous  .mirth.  Much  of  the  humour 
of  the  book  consists  rather  in  ludicrous  situations 
than  in  any  real  delicacy  of  wit.  Too  often 
the  laugh  is  at  another's  discomfiture,  and  so 
fails  to  please  the  present  age  with  its  kindlier 
feeling  towards  others.  Such  are  the  practical 
jokes  which  Captain  Mirvan  plays  upon  Madame 
Duval.  In  one  instance,  disguised  as  a  robber, 
he  waylays  the  lady's  coach,  and  leaves  her  in  a 
ditch  with  her  feet  tied  to  a  tree.  The  many 
tricks  which  the  doughty  Salt  plays  upon  this 
lady  so  much  resemble  some  of  the  humorous 
scenes  in  Joseph  Andrews,  and  Tom  Jones 


Fanny  Burney 

that  we  may  infer  the  readers  of  that  century 
found  them  laughable.  The  Captain  and  the 
French  woman  are  two  puppets  which  serve  to 
introduce  much  of  this  horse-play.  They  are 
not  even  caricatures;  they  are  entirely  unlike 
anything  in  human  life.  With  the  exception 
of  these  two  characters,  all  the  men  and  women 
who  provoked  the  mirth  of  the  heroine  are  well 
portrayed. 

Miss  Burney  is  less  felicitous  in  her  descriptions 
of  serious  characters.  Lord  Orville,  the  same 
type  of  man  as  Sir  Charles  Grandison,  is  true 
only  in  the  sense  that  Miss  Burney  announces 
the  truth  of  the  entire  book.  "I  have  not  pre- 
tended to  show  the  world  what  it  actually  is, 
(but  what  it  appears  to  a  girl  of  seventeen,"  she 
wrote  in  the  preface  to  Evelina.  Lord  Orville, 
all  dignity,  nobility,  charm,  and  perfection,  is 
but  the  ideal  of  a  young  girl. 

Evelina  was  a  new  woman  in  literature,  a, 
revelation  to  the  men  of  the  time  of  George  the 
Third.  The  sincerity  of  the  book  could  not 
be  doubted.  "But,"  they  asked,  "did  Evelina 
represent  the  woman's  point  of  view  of  life? 
Surely  no  man  ever  held  like  views."  The 
Lovelaces  and  Tom  Joneses  are  not  so  attractive 
as  when  seen  through  the  eyes  of  their  own 
sex,  arid. the  heroines  are  not  so  soft  and  yielding 
as  a  man  would  create  them.  Evelina,  like  all 
"Miss  Burney 's  heroines,  is  independent,  fearless, 


54      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

and  witty,  with  scarcely  a  trace  of  the  tradi- 
tional  heroine^or  notion,  saints  and  Mag-' 
dalenes  have  always  appealed  to  the  masculine 
imagination.  La  donna  dolorosa  has  occupied 
a  prominent  place  in  the  art  and  literature  of 
man's  creation.  Here  he  has  revealed  his  sex 
egoism  in  all  its  nudity:  the  woman  weeping 
for  man,  either  lover,  husband,  or  son;  man  the 
centre  of  her  thoughts,  her  hopes  and  fears. 
This  new  heroine  with  a  new  regard  towards 
man  was  a  revelation  to  them.  Evelina  was  the 
first  woman  to  break  the  spelL  to  show  them 
woman  as  woman,  in  lieu  of  woman  as  parasite 
and  adjunct  to  man.  Evelina  is  noT~aTways" 
pleasing;  she  hasn't  always  good  manners; 
she  sometimes  laughs  in  the  faces  of  the  dashing^ 
beaux  who  are  addressing  her.  But  she  is  a" 
woman  of  real  flesh  and  blood ;  such  women  have- 
existed  in  all  time,  and,  like  many  women  we. 
meet  every  day  and  whom  men  in  all  ages  have 
known,  Evelina  insists  on  being  the  centre  of 
every  scene. 

In  July,  1782,  Miss  Burney's  second  book, 
Cecilia,  or  Memoirs  of  an  Heiress,  was  published. 
This  novel  met  with  as  enthusiastic  a  reception  as 
Evelina.  Gibbon  read  the  whole  five  volumes 
in  a  day;  Burke  declared  they  had  cost  him 
three  days,  though  he  did  not  part  with  the 
story  from  the  time  he  first  opened  it,  and  had 
sat  up  a  whole  night  to  finish  it ;  and  Sir  Joshua 


Fanny  Burney  55 

Reynolds  had  been  fed  while  reading  it,  because 
he  refused  to  quit  it  at  the  table. 

The  book  shows  more  care  and  effort  than 
Evelina.  That  was  an  outburst  of  youthful  vi- 
vacity and  spirits,  but  in  Cecilia  the  author 
is  striving  to  do  her  best.  This  is  particularly 
revealed  in  the  style,  which  shows  the  influence 
of  Doctor  Johnson,  for  it  has  lost  the  simplicity 
of  Evelina.  The  diction  is  more  ambitious,  and 
the  sentences  are  longer,  many  of  them  balanced. 
Even  some  of  the  inferior  characters  from  their 
speech,  appear  to  have  received  a  lesson  in 
English  composition  from  Dr.  Johnson. 

But  the  novel  owes  its  place  among  English 
classics  to  the  varieties  of  characters  portrayed 
Vand  the  vivid  pictures  of  English  life.  Here 
again  the  gaieties  of  Vauxhall,  Ranelagh,  Maryle- 
bone  and  the  Pantheon  have  become  immortal, 
drawn  with  colours  as  vivid  and  enduring  as 
Hogarth  used  in  painting  the  sadder  sides  of 
London  life.  No  other  writer  has  brought  these 
places  before  our  eyes  as  clearly  and  as  fully 
as  Fanny  Burney. 

The  plot  of  Cecilia,  like  that  of  Evelina,  is  scT 
arranged  as  to  present  different  classes  of  society. 
Cecilia  has  three  guardians,  with  one  of  whom  she 
must  live  during  her  minority.  First  she  visits 
Mr.  Harrel,  a  gay,  fashionable  man,  a  spendthrift 
and  a  gambler,  who  lives  in  a  fashionable  house 
in  Portman  Square,  where  Cecilia,  during  a  con- 


56      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

stant  round  of  festivities,  meets  the  fashionable 
people  of  London.  Next  she  visits  Mr.  Briggs  in 
the  City,  "a  short  thick,, sturdy  man,  with  very 
small  keen  black  eyes,  a  square  face,  a  dark 
complexion,  and  a  snub  nose."  He  was  so 
miserly  that  when  Cecilia  asked  for  pen,  ink, 
and  a  sheet  of  paper,  he  gave  her  a  slate  and 
pencil,  as  he  supposed  she  had  nothing  of 
consequence  to  say.  He  was  as  sparing  of 
his  words  as  of  his  money,  and  used  the  same 
elliptical  sentences  in  his  speech  as  Dickens 
afterwards  put  into  the  mouth  of  Alfred  Jin- 
gle, the  famous  character  in  Pickwick  Pa- 
pers. He  thus  advises  Cecilia  in  regard  to 
her  lovers:  "Take  care  of  sharpers;  don't 
trust  shoe-buckles,  nothing  but  Bristol  stones! 
tricks  in  all  things.  A  fine  gentleman  sharp 
as  another  man.  Never  give  your  heart  to 
a  gold-topped  cane,  nothing  but  brass  gilt  over. 
Cheats  everywhere:  fleece  you  in  a  year;  won't 
leave  you  a  groat.  But  one  way  to  be  safe, 
— bring  'em  all  to  me."  Lastly  she  visits  Mr. 
Delvile,  her  third  guardian,  a  man  of  family, 
who  despised  both  the  men  associated  with 
him  as  trustees  of  Cecilia;  he  lived  in  such 
gloomy  state  in  his  magnificent  old  house 
in  St.  James's  Square  that  it  inspired  awe, 
and  repressed  all  pleasure.  Pride  in  their  birth 
and  prejudice  against  all  parvenus  were  the 
faults  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Delvile. 


Fanny  Burney  57 

Besides  these  characters,  there  were  many 
others  whose  names  were  for  a  long  time  famil- 
iar in  every  household.  Sir  Robert  Floyer  was 
as  vain  as  Mr.  Smith.  Mr.  Meadows  was  con- 
stantly bored  to  death ;  it  was  insufferable  exer- 
tion to  talk  to  a  quiet  woman,  and  a  talkative  one 
put  him  into  a  fever.  At  the  opera  the  solos  de- 
pressed him  and  the  full  orchestra  fatigued 
him.  He  yawned  while  ladies  were  talking  to 
him,  and  after  he  had  begged  them  to  repeat 
what  they  had  said,  forgot  to  listen.  "I  am 
tired  to  death!  tired  of  everything,"  was  his 
constant  expression. 

In  his  critical  essay  on  Madame  D'Arblay, 
Fanny  Burney's  married  name,  under  which 
her  later  works  were  published,  Macaulay  has 
thus  dealt  with  her  treatment  of  character: 

"Madame  D'Arblay  has  left  us  scarcely  any- 
thing but  humours.  Almost  every  one  of  her 
men  and  women  has  some  one  propensity 
developed  to  a  morbid  degree.  In  Cecilia, 
for  example,  Mr.  Del  vile  never  opens  his  lips 
without  some  allusion  to  his  own  birth  and 
station;  or  Mr.  Briggs  without  some  allusion 
to  the  hoarding  of  money;  or  Mr.  Hobson, 
without  betraying  the  self-indulgence  and  self- 
importance  of  a  purse-proud  upstart;  or  Mr. 
Simkins,  without  uttering  some  sneaking  remark 
for  the  purpose  of  currying  favour  with  his 
customers;  or  Mr.  Meadows,  without  expressing 


58      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

apathy  and  weariness  of  life;  or  Mr.  Albany, 
without  declaiming  about  the  vices  of  the  rich 
and  the  misery  of  the  poor;  or  Mrs.  Belfield, 
without  some  indelicate  eulogy  on  her  son; 
or  Lady  Margaret,  without  indicating  jealousy 
of  her  husband.  Morrice  is  all  skipping,  officious 
impertinence,  Mr.  Gosport  all  sarcasm,  Lady 
Honoria  all  lively  prattle,  Miss  Larolles  all  silly 
prattle;  if  ever  Madame  D'Arblay  aimed  at 
more,  as  in  the  character  of  Monckton,  we  do 
not  think  that  she  succeeded  well.  .  .  .  The 
variety  of  humours  which  is  to  be  found  in  her 
novels  is  immense;  and  though  the  talk  of  each 
person  separately  is  monotonous,  the  general 
effect  is  not  monotony,  but  a  most  lively  and 
agreeable  diversity." 

While  the  character  of  Monckton  is  not  strongly 
drawn,  one  or  two  scenes  in  which  he  figures 
have  great  power.  Mr.  Monckton,  who  had 
married  an  aged  woman  for  her  money,  lived  in 
constant  hope  of  her  dissolution.  He  planned 
to  keep  Cecilia  from  marrying  until  that  happy 
event,  when  he  schemed  to  make  her  his  bride, 
and  thus  acquire  a  second  fortune.  He  had 
used  his  influence  as  a  family  friend  to  prejudice 
her  lovers  in  her  eyes,  and  had  just  succeeded 
in  breaking  up  an  intimacy  which  he  feared: 
"A  weight  was  removed  from  his  mind  which 
had  nearly  borne  down  even  his  remotest  hopes ; 
the  object  of  his  eager  pursuit  seemed  still 


Fanny  Burney  59 

within  his  reach,  and  the  rival  into  whose  power 
he  had  so  lately  almost  beheld  her  delivered,  was 
totally  renounced,  and  no  longer  to  be  dreaded. 
A  revolution  such  as  this,  raised  expectations 
more  sanguine  than  ever;  and  in  quitting  the 
house,  he  exultingly  considered  himself  released 
from  every  obstacle  to  his  view, — till,  just  as  he 
arrived  home,  he  recollected  his  wife!" 

Cecilia,  the  heroine  of  the  novel^  is  only. 
Evelina  grown  a  little  older,  a  little  sadder,  a 
litEIe~more  worldly  wise.  The  humour  is,  too,  a 
little  kin33Ier7'"~TEe*  practical  jokes  so  common 
in  Evelina  do  not  mar  the  pages  of  Cecilia. 
At  times  the  latter  novel  becomes  almost  tragic. 
The  scene  at  Vauxhall  where  Mr.  Harrel  puts 
an  end  to  his  life  of  dissipation  is  dramatic  and 
thrilling.  But  Miss  Burney  had  lost  the  buoy- 
ancy and  lively  fancy  which  made  the  charm  of 
Evelina. 

Miss  Burney's  last  two  novels,  Camilla,  or  a 
Picture  of  Youth  and  The  Wanderer,  or  Female 
Difficulties,  have  no  claim  to  a  place  among 
English  classics.  It  is  strange  that,  as  she  saw 
more  of  life,  she  depicted  it  with  less  accuracy. 
This  might  seem  to  show  that  her  first  novels  owe 
their  excellence  to  her  vivid  imagination  rather 
than  to  her  powers  of  observation.  Her  weary 
life  at  court  as  second  keeper  of  the  robes 
to  Queen  Charlotte;  her  marriage  to  Monsieur 
D'Arblay,  and  the  sorrows  that  came  to  her  as 


60      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

the  wife  of  a  French  refugee;  all  her  deeper 
experiences  of  life  during  the  fourteen  years  be- 
tween the  publication  of  Cecilia  and  Camilla — 
these  had  completely  changed  her  light,  humor- 
ous view  of  externals,  and  with  that  loss  her 
power  as  an  artist  disappeared. 

Camilla  has  several  heroines  whose  love 
affairs  interest  the  reader.  It  thus  bears  a 
resemblance  to  Miss  Austen's  novels,  who  speaks 
of  it  with  admiration  and  was,  perhaps,  in- 
fluenced by  it.  Eugenia,  who  has  received  the 
education  of  a  man,  is  pleasing.  Clermont 
Lynmere,  like  Mr.  Smith  and  Sir  Robert  Floyer, 
imagines  that  all  the  ladies  are  in  love  with  him. 
Sir  Hugh  Tyrold,  with  his  love  for  the  classics 
and  his  regret  that  he  had  not  been  beaten  into 
learning  them  when  he  was  a  boy,  his  strict 
ideas  of  virtue  and  his  desire  to  make  everybody 
happy,  is  well  conceived,  but  the  outlines  are  not 
strong  enough  to  make  him  a  living  character. 
Camilla  shows  more  than  Cecilia  the  style  of 
Dr.  Johnson.  It  is  heavy  and  slow,  the  words 
are  long,  and  many  of  them  of  Latin  derivation. 

It  was  not  until  the  year  1814,  the  year  of 
Waverley,  that  her  last  novel,  The  Wanderer, 
or  Female  Difficulties,  was  published,  which, 
following  the  style  of  Camilla,  was  in  five  vol- 
umes. It  was  partly  founded  on  incidents  aris- 
ing out  of  the  French  Revolution.  The  book 
was  eagerly  awaited ;  the  publishers  paid  fifteen 


Fanny   Burney  61 

hundred  guineas  for  it ;  but  even  the  friendliest 
critic  pronounced  it  a  literary  failure. 

To  sum  up,  Macaulay  in  the  essay  before 
quoted  makes  clear  Miss  Burney's  place  in 
fiction : 

"Miss  Burney  did  for  the  English  novel 
what  Jeremy  Collier  did  for  the  English  drama; 
and  she  did  it  in  a  better  way.  She  first  showed 
that  a  tale  might  be  written  in  which  both  the 
fashionable  and  the  vulgar  life  of  London  might 
be  exhibited  with  great  force  and  with  broad 
comic  humour,  and  which  yet  should  not  con- 
tain a  single  line  inconsistent  with  rigid  morality, 
or  even  with  virgin  delicacy.  She  took  away  the 
reproach  which  lay  on  a  most  useful  and  delight- 
ful species  of  composition.  She  vindicated  the 
right  of  her  sex  to  an  equal  share  in  a  fair  and 
noble  province  of  letters  ...  we  owe  to  her 
not  only  Evelina,  Cecilia,  and  Camilla,  but  also 
Mansfield  Park  and  The  Absentee." 


CHAPTER  IV 

Hannah  More 

DURING  the  time  that  Dr.  Johnson  domi- 
nated the  literary  conscience  of  England, 
a  group  of  ladies  who  had  wearied  of  whist  and 
quadrille,  the  common  amusements  of  fashion, 
used  to  meet  at  the  homes  of  one  another  to  dis- 
cuss literary  and  political  subjects.  They  were 
called  in  ridicule  the  "Blue  Stocking  Club,"  be- 
cause Mr.  Benjamin  Stillingfleet,  who  was  always 
present  at  these  gatherings,  wore  hose  of  that 
colour.  Among  the  members  distinguished  by 
their  wit  and  talents  were  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Mon- 
tagu, the  author  of  an  Essay  on  the  Genius  of 
Shakespeare]  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Carter,  a  poetess 
and  excellent  Greek  scholar;  Mrs. Chapone,  whose 
Letters  to  Young  Ladies  formed  the  standard 
of  conduct  for  young  women  of  two  generations ; 
Miss  Reynolds,  the  sister  of  Sir  Joshua;  and 
Mrs.  Vesey,  noted  as  a  charming  hostess.  Dr. 
Johnson,  David  Garrick,  Reynolds,  and  Burke 
were  frequenters  of  this  club.  One  may  well 
imagine  that  the  conversation  and  wit  of  the  Blue 
62 


Hannah  More  63 

Stockings  were  far  too  rare  to  be  understood 
by  the  grosser  minds  of  the  mere  devotees  of 
fashion,  who  in  consequence  threw  a  ridicule 
upon  them  which  has  always  adhered  to  the 
name. 

Hannah  More,  who  had  already  become  known 
as  a  playwright,  visited  London  in  1773,  and 
at  once  was  welcomed  by  this  group.  In  a 
poem  called  The  Bas  Bleu,  dedicated  to  Mrs. 
Vesey,  she  thus  describes  the  pleasure  of  these 
meetings : 

Enlighten 'd  spirits!     You,  who  know 
What  charms  from  polish'd  converse  flow, 
Speak,  for  you  can,  the  pure  delight 
When  kindling  sympathies  unite; 
When  correspondent  tastes  impart 
Communion  sweet  from  heart  to  heart; 
You  ne'er  the  cold  gradations  need 
Which  vulgar  souls  to  union  lead ; 
No  dry  discussion  to  unfold 
The  meaning  caught  ere  well 't  is  told: 
In  taste,  in  learning,  wit,  or  science, 
Still  kindled  souls  demand  alliance: 
Each  in  the  other  joys  to  find 
The  image  answering  to  his  mind. 

The  Blue  Stocking  Club  was  composed  largely 
of  Tories,  so  that  when  all  Europe  became 
restless  under  the  influence  of  the  French 
Revolution,  they  strongly  combated  the  level- 
ling doctrines  of  democracy.  Hannah  More  in 


64      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

particular,  who  had  been  conducting  schools  for 
the  very  poor  near  Bristol,  saw  how  the  teachings 
of  the  revolutionists  affected  men  already  prone 
to  idleness  and  drink.  To  offset  these  influences, 
she  published  a  little  book  with  the  following 
title-page:  "Village  Politics.  Addressed  to 
all  the  Mechanics,  Journeymen,  and  Labour- 
ers, in  Great  Britain.  By  Will  Chip,  a  country 
Carpenter." 

It  is  not  a  novel  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word, 
but  in  simple  language,  easily  understood,  it 
teaches  the  labouring  people  the  inconsistent 
attitude  of  France,  and  the  strength  and  safety 
of  the  English  constitution.  It  is  not  a  deep 
book,  but  has  good  work-a-day  common-sense, 
such  as  keeps  the  world  jogging  on,  ready  to  en- 
dure the  ills  it  has  rather  than  fly  to  others  it 
knows  not  of. 

The  book  is  in  the  form  of  a  dialogue  between 
Jack  Anvil,  the  blacksmith,  and  Tom  Hood, 
the  mason. 

"ToM.  But  have  you  read  the  Rights  of 
Man  ? 

"JACK.  No,  not  I:  I  had  rather  by  half  read 
the  Whole  Duty  of  Man.  I  have  but  little  time 
for  reading,  and  such  as  I  should  therefore 
only  read  a  bit  of  the  best." 

"ToM.  And  what  dost  thou  take  a  democrat 
to  be? 


Hannah  More  65 

'•'JACK.  One  who  likes  to  be  governed  by  a 
thousand  tyrants,  and  yet  can't  bear  a  king." 

' '  TOM.     What  is  it  to  be  an  enlightened  people? 

"JACK.  To  put  out  the  light  of  the  Gospel, 
confound  right  and  wrong,  and  grope  about  in 
pitch  darkness." 

"ToM.     And  what  is  benevolence? 

"JACK.  Why,  in  the  new-fangled  language, 
it  means  contempt  of  religion,  aversion  to 
justice,  overturning  of  law,  doating  on  all 
mankind  in  general,  and  hating  everybody  in 
particular." 

For  a  long  time  the  authorship  of  the  book 
remained  a  secret,  and  Will  Chip  became  a 
notable  figure.  The  clergy  and  the  land-owners 
in  particular  rejoiced  over  his  homely  common- 
sense,  and  distributed  these  pamphlets  broad- 
cast over  the  land.  One  hundred  thousand 
copies  were  sold  in  a  short  time.  Village  Pol- 
itics is  said  to  have  been  one  of  the  strongest 
influences  in  England  to  awaken  the  common 
people  to  the  dangers  which  lie  in  a  sudden 
overthrow  of  government.  The  book  was 
timely,  for  that  decade  had  become  intoxicated 
by  the  name  of  Liberty.  To-day  democracy  and 
equality  are  no  longer  feared. 

During  many  years  Hannah  More  worked 
industriously  among  the  poor  of  Cheddar  anci 


66      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

its  vicinity.  On  a  visit  to  the  Cliffs  of  Ched- 
dar she  found  an  ignorant,  half-savage  people, 
many  of  whom  dwelt  in  the  caves  and  fissures 
of  the  rocks,  and  earned  a  miserable  subsistence 
by  selling  stalactites  and  other  minerals  native 
to  the  place,  to  the  travellers  who  were  attracted 
thither  by  the  beautiful  scenery.  Among  these 
people  Hannah  More  opened  a  Sunday-school, 
and  later  a  day  school,  where  the  girls  were 
taught  knitting,  spinning,  and  sewing.  A  girl 
trained  in  her  school  was  presented  on  her 
marriage  day  with  five  shillings,  a  pair  of  white 
stockings,  and  a  new  Bible.  The  teaching  in 
the  schools  was  so  practical  that  within  a  year 
schools  were  opened  in  nine  parishes. 

In  this  missionary  work,  Miss  More  became 
intimately  acquainted  not  only  with  the  very 
poor,  but  also  with  the  rich  farmers  living  in  the 
neighbourhood  and  the  prosperous  tradespeople 
of  the  villages.  From  these  better  educated 
men  she  met  with  great  opposition.  One  petty 
landlord  met  her  request  for  assistance  with  the 
remark:  "The  lower  classes  are  fated  to  be  poor, 
ignorant  and  wicked ;  and  wise  as  you  are,  you 
cannot  alter  what  is  decreed."  Another  man 
informed  her  that  religion  was  the  worst  thing 
for  the  poor,  it  made  them  so  lazy  and  useless. 

But  the  minds  of  the  people  had  been  awakened 
by  the  French  Revolution.  They  were  begin- 


Hannah   More  67 

ning  to  think.  Books  and  ballads  attacking 
church  and  constitution  were  hawked  through 
the  country  and  placed  within  reach  of  all. 
To  counteract  the  influence  of  these  "corrupt 
and  inflammatory  publications"  Hannah  More, 
between  the  years  1795-1798,  published  The 
Cheap  Repository,  the  first  regular  issue  of  this 
kind.  Every  month  a  story,  a  ballad,  and  a 
tract  for  Sunday  were  published.  Hannah  More 
knew  so  well  the  common  reasoning  and  the 
mental  attitude  of  those  for  whom  she  wrote, 
that  she  was  able  to  make  her  lessons  most 
effective.  So  great  was  the  demand  for  these 
chap-books  that  over  two  million  were  sold 
the  first  year.1 

These  stories  were  divided  into  two  classes, 
those  for  "persons  of  middle  rank"  and  those 
for  the  common  people.  The  former  point  out 
the  dangers  of  pride  and  covetousness ;  of  sub- 
stituting abstract  philosophy  for  religion;  and 
warn  masters  not  to  forget  their  moral  obliga- 
tions towards  their  servants.  The  latter  aim  to 
teach  neatness,  sobriety,  regularity  in  church 
attendance,  and  point  out  the  happiness  of  those 
who  follow  these  precepts,  and  the  misery  of 
those  who  neglect  them. 

i  For  a  complete  bibliography  of  these  chap-books, 
see  the  Catalogue  of  English  and  American  Chap-Books 
in  Harvard  College  Library,  pp.  8-10;  compiled  in  part 
by  Charles  Welsh. 


68      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Her  two  best  known  stories  are  Mr.  Fantom 
and  The  Shepherd  of  Salisbury  Plain.  Mr. 
Fantom:  or  the  History  of  the  New-Fashioned 
Philosopher,  and  his  Man  William  was  written 
to  warn  masters  of  the  danger  of  teaching  their 
servants  disrespect  for  the  Bible  and  for  civil 
law.  Mr.  Fantom  was  a  shallow  man,  who  glided 
upon  the  surface  of  philosophy  and  culled  those 
precepts  which  relieved  his  conscience  from  any 
moral  obligations.  When  he  was  asked  to 
help  the  poor  in  his  own  parish,  he  refused  to 
consider  their  wants  because  his  mind  was  so 
engrossed  by  the  partition  of  Poland.  Like 
Mrs.  Jellyby  of  a  later  time,  he  was  so  much 
troubled  by  sufferings  which  he  could  not  see 
that  he  neglected  his  family  and  servants. 
When  he  reprimanded  his  butler,  William,  for 
being  intoxicated,  the  young  man  replied: 
"Why,  sir,  you  are  a  philosopher,  you  know; 
and  I  have  often  overheard  you  say  to  your 
company,  that  private  vices  are  public  benefits; 
and  so  I  thought  that  getting  drunk  was  as 
pleasant  a  way  of  doing  good  to  the  public  as 
any,  especially  when  I  could  oblige  my  muster 
at  the  same  time."  In  course  of  time  William 
became  a  thief  and  a  murderer,  and  expiated 
his  crimes  on  the  scaffold. 

In  contrast  to  this  is  The  Shepherd  of  Salis- 
bury Plain.  This  shepherd  was  contented  with 
his  lot,  and  says:  "David  was  happier  when  he 


Hannah   More  69 

kept  his  father's  sheep  on  such  a  plain  as  this, 
and  employed  in  singing  some  of  his  own  psalms 
perhaps,  than  ever  he  was  when  he  became 
king  of  Israel  and  Judah.  And  I  dare  say 
we  should  never  have  had  some  of  the  most 
beautiful  texts  in  all  those  fine  psalms,  if  he 
had  not  been  a  shepherd,  which  enabled  him  to 
make  so  many  fine  comparisons  and  similitudes, 
as  one  may  say,  from  country  life,  flocks  of 
sheep,  hills  and  valleys,  fields  of  corn,  and 
fountains  of  water."  The  shepherd's  neat  cot- 
tage with  its  simple  furnishings,  his  frugal 
wife  and  industrious  children  are  described  in 
simple  and  convincing  language. 

In  the  stories  of  the  poor  there  are  many 
interesting  details  of  the  everyday  life  of  that 
class  that  did  not  blossom  into  heroes  and 
heroines  of  romance  for  nearly  half  a  century. 
Mrs.  Sponge,  in  The  History  of  Betty  Brown, 
the  St.  Giles's  Orange  Girl,  is  a  character  that 
Dickens  might  have  immortalised.  Mrs.  Sponge 
kept  a  little  shop  and  a  kind  of  eating-house  for 
poor  girls  near  the  Seven  Dials.  She  received 
stolen  goods,  and  made  such  large  profits  in  her 
business  that  she  was  enabled  to  become  a 
broker  among  the  poor.  She  loaned  Betty  five 
shillings  to  set  her  up  in  the  orange  business; 
she  did  not  ask  for  the  return  of  her  money,  but 
exacted  a  sixpence  a  day  for  its  use,  and  was 
regarded  by  Betty,  and  the  other  girls  whom 


70      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

she  thus  befriended,  as  a  benefactor.  At  last, 
Betty  was  rescued  from  the  clutches  of  Mrs. 
Sponge.  By  industry  and  piety  she  became 
mistress  of  a  handsome  sausage-shop  near  the 
Seven  Dials,  and  married  a  hackney  coachman, 
the  hero  of  one  of  Miss  More's  ballads: 

I  am  a  bold  coachman,  and  drive  a  good  hack 
With  a  coat  of  five  capes  that  quite  covers  my  back ; 
And  my  wife  keeps  a  sausage-shop,  not  many  miles 
From  the  narrowest  alley  in  all  broad  St.  Giles. 
Though  poor,  we  are  honest  and  very  content, 
We  pay  as  we  go,  for  meat,  drink,  and  for  rent ; 
To  work  all  the  week  I  am  able  and  willing, 
I  never  get  drunk,  and  I  waste  not  a  shilling; 
And  while  at  a  tavern  my  gentleman  tarries, 
The  coachman  grows  richer  than  he  whom  he  carries, 
And  I  'd  rather  (said  I),  since  it  saves  me  from  sin, 
Be  the  driver  without,  than  the  toper  within. 

The  Cheap  Repository  was  written  to  teach 
moral  precepts.  Neither  Hannah  More  nor  her 
readers  saw  any  artistic  beauty  in  the  sordid 
lives  of  this  lower  stratum  of  society.  They 
were  not  interested  in  the  superstitions  of 
"Poor  Sally  Evans,"  who  hung  a  plant  called 
"midsummer-men"  in  her  room  on  Midsummer 
eve  so  that  she  might  learn  by  the  bending  of 
the  leaves  if  her  lover  were  true  to  her,  and  who 
consulted  all  the  fortune-tellers  that  came  to  her 
door  to  learn  whether  the  two  moles  on  her 
cheek  foretold  two  husbands  or  two  children. 


Hannah  More  71 

Hannah  More  recorded  these  simple  fancies  of 
poor  Sally  only  to  show  her  folly  and  the  mis- 
fortunes that  afterwards  befell  her  on  account 
of  her  superstitions.  Writers  of  that  century 
either  laughed  at  the  ignorant  blunders  of  the 
poor,  or  used  them  to  point  a  moral.  An  interest 
in  them  because  they  are  human  beings  like 
ourselves  with  common  frailties  belongs  to  the 
next  century.  Nothing  proves  more  conclu- 
sively the  growth  of  the  democratic  idea  than 
the  changed  attitude  of  the  novel  toward  the 
ignorant  and  the  criminal. 

Hannah  More  was  always  interested  in  the 
education  of  young  ladies.  She  wrote  a  series 
of  essays  called  Strictures  on  the  Modern 
System  of  Female  Education,  in  which  she 
protested  loudly  against  the  tendency  to  give 
girls  an  ornamental  rather  than  a  useful  educa- 
tion. This  was  so  highly  approved  that  she  was 
asked  to  make  suggestions  for  the  education  of 
the  Princess  Charlotte.  This  led  to  her  writing 
Hints  towards  Forming  the  Character  of  a  Young 
Princess. 

Hannah  More  finally  embodied  her  theories  on 
the  education  of  women  in  a  book  which  she 
thought  might  appeal  most  strongly  to  the  young 
ladies  themselves,  C&lebs  in  Search  of  a  Wife. 
Running  through  it,  is  a  slight  romance.  Ccelebs, 
filled  with  admiration  for  Eve,  as  described 


72      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

in  Paradise  Lost,  where  she  is  intent  on  her 
household  duties,  goes  forth  into  the  world  to 
find,  if  possible,  such  a  helpmate  for  himself. 
As  he  meets  different  women,  he  compares 
them  with  his  ideal,  and,  finding  them  lacking, 
passes  a  severe  criticism  upon  female  education 
and  accomplishments.  Finally,  he  meets  a 
lady  with  well-trained  mind,  who  delights  in 
works  of  charity  and  piety,  one  well  calculated 
to  conduct  wisely  the  affairs  of  his  household. 
She  has  besides  proper  humility,  and  accepts  with 
gratitude  the  honour  of  becoming  Ccelebs's  wife. 

Until  her  death  at  the  advanced  age  of  eighty- 
eight  years,  Hannah  More  continued  to  write 
moral  and  religious  essays,  so  that  she  was  be- 
fore the  public  view  for  over  fifty  years.  Mrs. 
S.  C.  Hall  in  her  book  Pilgrimages  to  English 
Shrines  thus  describes  her  in  old  age: 

"Hannah  More  wore  a  dress  of  very  light 
green  silk — a  white  China  crape  shawl  was 
folded  over  her  shoulders;  her  white  hair  was 
frizzled,  after  a  by-gone  fashion,  above  her  brow, 
and  that  backed,  as  it  were,  by  a  very  full  double 
border  of  rich  lace.  The  reality  was  as  dissimilar 
from  the  picture  painted  by  our  imagination  as 
anything  could  well  be;  such  a  sparkling,  light, 
bright,  '  summery  '-looking  old  lady — more  like 
a  beneficent  fairy,  than  the  biting  author  of 
Mr.  Fantom,  though  in  perfect  harmony  with 
The  Shepherd  of  Salisbury  Plain." 


CHAPTER  V 

Charlotte  Smith.     Mrs.   Inchbald 

WHILE  Hannah  More  was  endeavouring 
to  improve  the  condition  of  the  poor 
by  teaching  them  diligence  and  sobriety,  a  group 
of  earnest  men  and  women  were  writing  books 
and  pamphlets  in  which  they  claimed  that  pov- 
erty and  ignorance  were  due  to  unjust  laws. 
The  writings  of  Voltaire  and  Rousseau  had 
filled  their  minds  with  bright  pictures  of  a 
democracy.  These  theories  were  considered  most 
dangerous  in  England,  but  they  were  the  the- 
ories which  helped  to  shape  the  American 
constitution.  Among  these  English  revolution- 
ists were  William  Godwin,  Mary  Wollstonecraft, 
Charlotte  Smith,  Mrs.  Inchbald,  and  for  a  time 
Amelia  Opie. 

The  strongest  political  novel  was  Caleb  Wil- 
liams by  William  Godwin.  In  this  he  shows 
how  through  law  man  may  become  the  de- 
stroyer of  man.  This  interest  in  the  rights  of 
man  awakened  interest  in  the  condition  of  wo- 
men; and  Mary  Wollstonecraft,  who  afterward 
73 


74      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

became  Mrs.  Godwin,  wrote  Vindication  of  the 
Rights  of  Woman.  This  pamphlet  was  declared 
contrary  to  the  Bible  and  to  Christian  law, 
although  all  its  demands  have  now  been  con- 
ceded. Charlotte  Smith  was  also  interested  in 
the  position  of  women  and  the  laws  affecting 
them.  In  Desmond  she  discussed  freely  a 
marriage  problem  which  in  her  day  seemed 
very  bold,  while  in  her  private  life  she  ignored 
British  prejudices. 

She  was  the  mother  of  twelve  children  and 
the  wife  of  a  man  of  many  schemes,  so  that 
she  was  continually  devising  ways  to  extricate 
her  large  family  from  the  financial  difficulties 
into  which  he  plunged  them.  At  one  time  a  friend 
suggested  to  her  that  her  husband's  attention 
should  be  turned  toward  religion.  Her  reply 
was:  "Oh,  for  heaven's  sake,  do  not  put  it  into 
his  head  to  take  to  religion,  for  if  he  does,  he 
will  instantly  begin  by  building  a  cathedral." 
She  is  supposed  to  have  caricatured  him  in  the 
projector  who  hoped  to  make  a  fortune  by 
manuring  his  estate  with  old  wigs.  But  when 
her  husband  was  imprisoned  for  debt,  she 
shared  his  captivity,  and  began  to  write  to  sup- 
port her  family.  Although  she  died  at  the 
age  of  fifty-seven,  she  found  time  during  her 
manifold  cares  to  write  thirty- eight  volumes. 

But  not  only  did  Mrs.  Smith  endure  sorrows 
as  great  as  those  of  her  favourite  heroine,  Sidney 


Charlotte    Smith  75 

Biddulph,  but  one  of  her  daughters  was  equally 
unfortunate.  She  was  married  unhappily,  and 
returned  with  her  three  children  for  her  mother 
to  support.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Smith,  after  twenty- 
three  years  of  married  life,  agreed  to  live  in 
separate  countries,  he  in  Normandy,  and  she  in 
England,  although  they  always  corresponded 
and  were  interested  in  each  other's  welfare. 
Yet  this  separation,  together  with  the  revo- 
lutionary tendencies  discovered  in  her  writings, 
raised  a  storm  of  criticism  against  her. 

In  Desmond,  which  was  regarded  as  so  danger- 
ous, Mrs.  Smith  has  presented  the  following 
problem:  Geraldine,  the  heroine,  is  married  to  a 
spendthrift,  who  attempts  to  retrieve  his  for- 
tunes by  forcing  his  wife  to  become  the  mistress 
of  his  friend,  the  rich  Due  de  Romagnecourt. 
To  preserve  her  honour  she  leaves  him,  hoping 
to  return  to  her  mother's  roof;  but  her  mother 
refuses  to  receive  her  and  bids  her  return  to  her 
husband.  As  she  dares  not  do  this,  and  is  with- 
out money,  a  faithful  friend,  Desmond,  takes  her 
under  his  protection,  asking  no  reward  but  the 
pleasure  of  serving  her.  Finally  Geraldine  re- 
ceives a  letter  informing  her  that  her  husband 
is  ill.  She  returns  to  him,  and  nurses  him  until 
he  dies;  after  a  year  of  mourning  she  marries 
Desmond. 

How  could  a  woman  have  behaved  more 
virtuously  than  Geraldine?  She  is  always  high- 


76      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

minded  and  actuated  by  the  purest  motives. 
But  it  was  feared  that  her  example  might  en- 
courage wives  to  desert  their  husbands,  and 
consequently  the  novel  was  declared  immoral. 

Desmond  was  published  in  1792,  when  the 
feeling  against  France  was  very  bitter  in  England. 
The  plot,  as  it  meanders  slowly  through  three 
volumes,  is  constantly  interrupted  by  political 
discussions.  The  author's  clearly  expressed 
preference  for  a  republican  government,  and  her 
criticism  of  English  law,  met  with  bitter  dis- 
approval. One  of  the  characters  pronounces 
a  panegyric  upon  the  greater  prosperity  and 
happiness  that  has  come  to  the  French  soldiers, 
farmers,  and  peasants,  since  they  came  to  be- 
lieve that  they  were  sharers  in  their  own  labours, 
and  the  hero  of  the  book,  writing  from  France 
to  a  friend  in  England,  says:  "I  lament  still 
more  the  disposition  which  too  many  English- 
men show  to  join  in  this  unjust  and  infamous 
crusade,  against  the  holy  standard  of  freedom; 
and  I  blush  for  my  country."  In  the  same 
book,  the  author  censures  the  penal  laws  of 
England,  by  which  robbery  to  the  amount  of 
forty  shillings  is  punishable  with  death;  and 
criticises  the  delay  of  the  courts  in  dealing 
justice. 

This  criticism  is  expressed  tamely,  barely 
more  than  suggested,  when  compared  with  the 
vigorous  attacks  which  Dickens  made  in  the 


Charlotte    Smith  7  7 

next  century  on  English  law  and  the  slow  action 
of  justice  in  the  famous  "Circumlocution  Office." 
Dickens  wrote  with  such  vigour  that  he  brought 
about  a  reform.  A  modern  reader  finds  Desmond 
earnest  and  sincere,  but  tame  to  the  point  of 
dulness.  It  seems  strange  how  the  Tory  party 
could  see  in  this  book  a  menace  to  the  Brit- 
ish constitution.  But  a  writer  in  the  Monthly 
Review  for  December,  1792,  advocated  her  cause. 
"She  is  very  justly  of  opinion,"  he  writes, 
"that  the  great  events  that  are  passing  in  the 
world  are  no  less  interesting  to  women  than 
to  men,  and  that,  in  her  solicitude  to  discharge 
the  domestic  duties,  a  woman  ought  not  to 
forget  that,  in  common  with  her  father  and 
husband,  her  brothers  and  sons,  she  is  a  citizen." 
The  publication  of  The  Old  Manor  House  in 
the  following  year  won  back  for  her  many  of 
the  friends  that  she  had  lost  by  Desmond,  But  in 
this  work  also  the  same  love  of  liberty,  the  same 
indifference  to  social  distinctions,  occur.  The 
hero  of  The  Old  Manor  House  joins  the  English 
army,  and  is  sent  to  fight  against  the  Americans ; 
in  the  many  reflections  upon  this  conflict,  the 
author  shows  that  her  sympathies  are  with  the 
colonists.  The  father  of  the  hero  had  married  a 
young  woman  who  had  nothing  to  recommend 
her  but  "beauty,  simplicity,  and  goodness." 
The  hero  himself  falls  in  love  with  and  marries 
a  girl  beneath  him  in  rank,  but  he  does  not  seem 


78      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

to  feel  that  he  has  done  a  generous  thing,  nor 
does  the  heroine  show  any  gratitude  for  this 
honour.  Each  seems  unconscious  that  their 
difference  in  rank  should  be  a  bar  to  their  union, 
provided  they  do  not  offend  old  Mrs.  Rayland, 
the  owner  of  the  manor.  A  great  change  had 
come  over  the  novel  since  Pamela  was  over- 
powered with  gratitude  to  her  profligate  master, 
Mr.  B,  for  condescending  to  make  her  his  wife. 

The  revolutionary  principles  of  Mrs.  Smith's 
novels  were  soon  forgotten,  but  two  new 
elements  were  introduced  by  her  that  bore  fruit 
in  English  fiction.  Her  great  gift  to  the  novel 
was  the  portrayal  of  refined,  quiet,  intellectual 
ladies,  beside  whom  Evelina  and  Cecilia  seem 
but  school-girls.  Her  heroines  may  be  poor, 
they  may  be  of  inferior  rank,  but  they  are 
always  ladies  of  sensitive  nature  and  cultivated 
manners,  and  are  drawn  with  a  feeling  and 
tenderness  which  no  novelist  before  her  had 
reached.  A  contemporary  said  of  Emmeline, 
"All  is  graceful,  and  pleasing  to  the  sight,  all, 
in  short,  is  simple,  femininely  beautiful  and 
chaste."  This  might  be  said  of  all  the  women 
she  has  created.  Old  Mrs.  Rayland,  the  central 
personage  in  her  most  popular  novel,  The  Old 
Manor  House,  notwithstanding  her  exalted  ideas 
of  her  own  importance  as  a  member  of  the 
Rayland  family,  and  the  arbitrary  manner  in 
which  she  compels  all  to  conform  to  her  old- 


Charlotte    Smith  79 

fashioned  notions,  is  always  the  high-born  lady. 
We  smile  at  her,  but  she  never  forfeits  our 
respect.  Scott  said  of  her,  "Old  Mrs.  Rayland 
is  without  a  peer." 

Mrs.  Smith's  second  gift  to  the  novel  was  her 
charming  descriptions  of  rural  scenery.  Nature 
had  for  a  long  time  been  banished  from  the  arts. 
Wordsworth  in  one  of  his  prefaces  wrote: 

"Excepting  The  Nocturnal  Reverie  of  Lady 
Winchelsea,  and  a  passage  or  two  in  the  Windsor 
Forest  of  Pope,  the  poetry  of  the  period  inter- 
vening between  the  publication  of  Paradise  Lost 
and  The  Seasons  does  not  contain  a  single  new 
image  of  external  nature;  and  scarcely  presents 
a  familiar  one,  from  which  it  can  be  inferred 
that  the  eye  of  the  Poet  had  been  steadily  fixed 
upon  his  object,  much  less  that  his  feelings  had 
urged  him  to  work  upon  it  in  the  spirit  of 
genuine  imagination." 

Fiction  was  as  barren  of  scenery  as  poetry. 
None  of  the  novelists  were  cognisant  of  the 
country  scenes  amid  which  their  plots  were  laid, 
with  the  possible  exception  of  Goldsmith. 
The  Vicar  of  Wakefield  has  a  rural  setting,  and 
there  are  references  to  the  trees,  the  blackbirds, 
and  the  hayfields;  but  description  is  not  intro- 
duced for  the  sake  of  its  own  beauty  as  in  the 
novels  of  Charlotte  Smith.  In  Ethelinda  there 
are  beautiful  descriptions  of  the  English  Lakes, 
part  of  the  scene  being  laid  at  Grasmere; 


8o      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Celestina  is  in  the  romantic  Provence;  Desmond 
in  Normandy;  and  in  The  Old  Manor  House 
we  have  the  soft  landscape  of  the  south  of 
England. 

In  The  Old  Manor  House  she  thus  describes 
one  of  the  paths  that  led  from  the  gate  of  the 
park  to  Rayland  Hall: 

"The  other  path,  which  in  winter  or  in  wet 
seasons  was  inconvenient,  wound  down  a  de- 
clivity, where  furze  and  fern  were  shaded  by 
a  few  old  hawthorns  and  self-sown  firs:  out  of 
the  hill  several  streams  were  filtered,  which, 
uniting  at  its  foot,  formed  a  large  and  clear 
pond  of  near  twenty  acres,  fed  by  several  im- 
perceptible currents  from  other  eminences  which 
sheltered  that  side  of  the  park;  and  the  bason 
between  the  hills  and  the  higher  parts  of  it 
being  thus  filled,  the  water  found  its  way  over 
a  stony  boundary,  where  it  was  passable  by  a 
foot  bridge  unless  in  time  of  floods;  and  from 
thence  fell  into  a  lower  part  of  the  ground, 
where  it  formed  a  considerable  river;  and, 
winding  among  willows  and  poplars  for  near 
a  mile,  again  spread  into  a  still  larger  lake,  on  the 
edge  of  which  was  a  mill,  and  opposite,  without 
the  park  paling,  wild  heaths,  where  the  ground 
was  sandy,  broken,  and  irregular,  still  however 
marked  by  plantations  made  in  it  by  the 
Rayland  family." 

Every  feature  of  the  landscape  is  brought 


Charlotte    Smith  81 

distinctly  before  the  eye.  Such  descriptions 
are  not  unusual  now,  but  they  were  first  used 
by  Charlotte  Smith. 

Even  more  realistic  is  the  picture  of  a  road 
in  a  part  of  the  New  Forest  near  Christchurch : 

"  It  was  a  deep,  hollow  road,  only  wide  enough 
for  waggons,  and  was  in  some  places  shaded  by 
hazel  and  other  brush  wood;  in  others,  by  old 
beech  and  oaks,  whose  roots  wreathed  about  the 
bank,  intermingled  with  ivy,  holly,  and  ever- 
green fern,  almost  the  only  plants  that  appeared 
in  a  state  of  vegetation,  unless  the  pale  and 
sallow  mistletoe,  which  here  and  there  partially 
tinted  with  faint  green  the  old  trees  above 
them. 

"Everything  was  perfectly  still  around;  even 
the  robin,  solitary  songster  of  the  frozen  woods, 
had  ceased  his  faint  vespers  to  the  setting  sun, 
and  hardly  a  breath  of  air  agitated  the  leafless 
branches.  This  dead  silence  was  interrupted  by 
no  sound  but  the  slow  progress  of  his  horse,  as  the 
hollow  ground  beneath  his  feet  sounded  as  if  he 
trod  on  vaults.  There  was  in  the  scene,  and  in 
this  dull  pause  of  nature,  a  solemnity  not  un- 
pleasant to  Orlando,  in  his  present  disposition 
of  mind." 

In  1842,  Miss  Mitford  wrote  to  Miss  Barrett: 
"Charlotte  Smith's  works,  with  all  their  faults, 
have  yet  a  love  of  external  nature,  and  a  power 


82      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

of  describing  it,  which  I  never  take  a  spring  walk 
without  feeling."  And  again  she  wrote  to  a 
friend  referring  to  Mrs.  Smith,  "Except  that 
they  want  cheerfulness,  nothing  can  exceed  the 
beauty  of  the  style." 

The  life  and  writings  of  Mrs.  Inchbald  had 
some  things  in  common  with  the  life  and  writings 
of  Mrs.  Smith.  Both  were  obliged  to  write  to 
support  themselves  as  well  as  those  dependent 
upon  them.  Both  had  seen  many  phases  of 
human  nature,  and  both  viewed  with  scorn  the 
pretensions  of  the  rich  and  beheld  with  pity  the 
sorrows  of  the  poor.  Both  were  champions  of 
social  and  political  equality.  Mrs.  Inchbald, 
however,  was  an  actress  and  a  successful  play- 
wright, hence  her  novels  are  the  more  dramatic, 
but  they  lack  the  beautiful  rural  setting  which 
gives  a  poetic  atmosphere  to  the  writings  of 
Charlotte  Smith. 

A  Simple  Story,  the  first  of  Mrs.  Inchbald's 
-  two  novels,  has  been  called  the  precursor  of  Jane 
Eyre.  It  is  the  first  novel  in  which  we  are  more 
interested  in  what  is  felt  than  in  what  actually 
happens.  Mr.  Dorriforth,  a  Catholic  priest,  and 
Miss  Milner,  his  ward,  fall  in  love  with  each 
other,  and  we  watch  this  hidden  passion,  which 
preys  upon  the  health  of  both.  He  is  horrified 
that  he  has  broken  his  vows;  she  is  mortified 
that  she  loves  a  man  who,  she  believes,  neither 


Mrs.    Inchbald  83 

can  nor  does  return  her  feeling  for  him.  When 
he  is  released  from  his  vow,  it  is  the  emotion, 
not  external  happenings,  that  holds  the  interest. 
The  first  part  of  the  story  is  brought  to  a  close 
with  the  marriage  of  Mr.  Dorriforth,  now  Lord 
Elmwood,  and  Miss  Milner. 

Seventeen  years  elapse  between  the  two 
halves  of  the  novel.  During  this  time  trouble 
has  come  between  them  and  they  have  separated. 
The  character  of  each  has  undergone  a  change. 
Traits  of  disposition  that  were  first  but  lightly 
observed  have  been  intensified  with  years. 
Mrs.  Inchbald  writes  of  the  hero:  "Dorriforth, 
the  pious,  the  good,  the  tender  Dorriforth,  is 
become  a  hard-hearted  tyrant;  the  compas- 
sionate, the  feeling,  the  just  Lord  Elmwood, 
an  example  of  implacable  rigour  and  justice." 
His  friend  Sandford  has  also  changed  with  the 
years,  but  he  has  been  softened,  not  hardened 
by  them  —  "the  reprover,  the  enemy  of  the 
vain,  the  idle,  and  the  wicked,  but  the  friend 
and  comforter  of  the  forlorn  and  miserable." 

The  story  of  Dorriforth  gives  unity  to  the 
two  parts  of  the  novel.  The  conflict  between  his 
love  and  his  anger  holds  the  reader  in  suspense 
until  the  conclusion.  The  characters  of  eigh- 
teenth-century fiction  were  actuated  by  but  a 
small  number  of  motives.  In  nearly  all  the 
novels  the  men  were  either  generous  and  free 
or  stingy  and  hypocritical;  the  women  were 


84      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

either  virtuous  and  winsome,  or  immoral  and 
brazen.  Mrs.  Inchbald  possessed,  only  in  a 
less  degree,  George  Eliot's  power  of  character- 
analysis;  she  observed  minor  qualities,  and 
she  was  as  unflinching  in  following  the  develop- 
ment of  evil  traits  to  a  tragic  conclusion  as  was 
the  author  of  Adam  Bede. 

In  The  Gentleman's  Magazine  for  March, 
1791,  some  one  wrote  of  A  Simple  Story: 

"She  has  struck  out  a  path  entirely  her  own. 
She  has  disdained  to  follow  the  steps  of  her 
predecessors,  and  to  construct  a  new  novel, 
as  is  too  commonly  done,  out  of  the  scraps  and 
fragments  of  earlier  inventors.  Her  principal 
character,  the  Roman  Catholic  lord,  is  perfectly 
new:  and  she  has  conducted  him,  through  a 
series  of  surprising  well-contrasted  adventures, 
with  an  uniformity  of  character  and  truth  of 
description  that  have  rarely  been  surpassed." 

There  is,  however,  one  hackneyed  scene.  A 
young  girl  is  seized,  thrust  into  a  chariot,  and 
carried  at  full  speed  to  a  lonely  place.  There 
is  hardly  an  early  novel  where  this  bald  incident 
is  not  worked  up  into  one  or  more  chapters,  with 
variations  to  suit  the  convenience  of  the  plot. 
It  was  as  much  a  part  of  the  stock  in  trade  of 
the  novelist  of  the  eighteenth  century  as  a 
family  quarrel  is  of  the  twentieth.  With  this 
exception,  A  Simple  Story  is  new  in  its  plot, 
incidents,  characters,  and  mode  of  treatment. 


Mrs.  Inchbald  85 

Emotion  did  not  play  so  important  a  part  in  a 
novel  again  until  Charlotte  Bronte  wrote  Jane 
Eyre. 

Mrs.  Inchbald's  only  other  novel,  Nature  and 
Art,  shows  the  artificialities  of  society.  Two 
cousins,  William  and  Henry,  are  contrasted. 
William  is  the  son  of  a  dean.  Henry's  father 
went  to  Africa  to  live,  whence  he  sent  his  son 
to  his  rich  uncle  to  be  educated.  Henry  fails 
to  comprehend  the  society  in  which  he  finds 
himself  placed,  and  cannot  understand  that 
there  should  be  any  poor  people. 

"  'Why,  here  is  provision  enough  for  all  the 
people,'  said  Henry;  'why  should  they  want? 
why  do  not  they  go  and  take  some  of  these 
things?' 

"  'They  must  not,'  said  the  dean,  'unless  they 
were  their  own.' 

"'What,  Uncle!  Does  no  part  of  the  earth, 
nor  anything  which  the  earth  produces,  belong 
to  the  poor?'  " 

His  uncle  fails  to  answer  this  question  to  his 
nephew's  satisfaction. 

The  vices  and  the  fawning  duplicity  of  William 
are  contrasted  with  the  virtues  and  independent 
spirit  of  Henry. 

1  'I  know  I  am  called  proud/  one  day  said 
William  to  Henry. 

"'Dear  Cousin,'  replied  Henry,  'it  must  be 
only  then  by  those  who  do  not  know  you;  for 


86      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

to  me  you  appear  the  humblest  creature  in  the 
world.' 

"  'Do  you  really  think  so?' 

"  *  I  am  certain  of  it ;  or  would  you  always  give 
up  your  opinion  to  that  of  persons  in  a  superior 
state,  however  inferior  in  their  understanding? 
...  I  have  more  pride  than  you,  for  I  will 
never  stoop  to  act  or  to  speak  contrary  to  my 
feelings.'  " 

William  rises  to  eminence,  in  time  becoming 
a  judge.  Henry,  who  is  always  virtuous,  can 
obtain  no  preferment.  This  contrast  in  the  two 
cousins  is  not  so  overdrawn  as  at  first  appears. 
William  represents  the  aristocracy  of  the  old 
world;  Henry,  the  free  representative  of  a  new 
country. 

A  tragic  story  runs  through  the  novel,  which 
becomes  intensely  dramatic  at  the  point  where 
William  puts  on  his  black  cap  to  pronounce  sen- 
tence on  the  girl  whom  he  had  ruined  years 
before.  He  does  not  recognise  her;  but  she, 
who  had  loved  him  through  the  years,  becomes 
insane,  not  at  the  thought  of  death,  but  that 
he  should  be  the  one  to  pronounce  the  sentence. 
It  is  doubtful  if  any  novelist  before  Scott  had 
produced  so  thrilling  a  situation,  a  situation 
which  grew  naturally  out  of  the  plot,  and  the 
anguish  of  the  poor  unfortunate  Agnes  has  the 
realism  of  Thomas  Hardy  or  Tolstoi. 

Only  by  reading  these  old  novels  can  one 


Mrs.   Inchbald  87 

comprehend  the  change  produced  in  England 
by  the  next  half -century.  The  teachings  of  Mrs. 
Charlotte  Smith  and  Mrs.  Inchbald  were  declared 
dangerous  to  the  state.  That  they  taught  disre- 
spect for  authority,  was  one  of  the  many  charges 
brought  against  them.  Yet  with  what  ladylike 
reserve  they  advance  views  which  a  later  gen- 
eration applauded  when  boldly  proclaimed  by 
Dickens,  Thackeray,  and  Disraeli! 


CHAPTER  VI 

Clara  Reeve.     Ann  Radcliffe. 
Harriet  and  Sophia  Lee 

THE  novel  of  the  mysterious  and  the  super- 
natural did  not  appear  in  modein  lit- 
erature until  Horace  Walpole  wrote  The  Castle 
of  Otranto  in  1764,  during  the  decade  that  was 
dominated  by  the  realism  of  Smollett  and  Sterne. 
The  author  says  it  was  an  attempt  to  blend  two 
kinds  of  romance,  the  ancient,  which  was  all  im- 
probable, and  the  modern,  which  was  a  realis- 
tic copy  of  nature.  The  machinery  of  this 
novel  is  clumsy.  An  enormous  helmet  and  a 
huge  sword  are  the  means  by  which  an  ancestor 
of  Otranto,  long  since  dead,  restores  the  castle 
to  a  seeming  peasant,  who  proves  to  be  the 
rightful  heir. 

This  book  produced  no  imitators  until  1777, 
when  Clara  Reeve  wrote  The  Old  English 
Baron,  which  was  plainly  suggested  by  Walpole's 
novel,  but  is  more  delicate  in  the  treatment 
of  its  ghostly  visitants.  Here,  as  in  The  Castle 
88 


Clara  Reeve  89 

of  Otranto,  the  rightful  heir  has  been  brought  up 
a  peasant,  ignorant  of  his  high  birth.  Again  his 
ancestors,  supposedly  dead  and  gone,  bring  him 
into  his  own.  One  night  he  is  made  to  sleep  in 
the  haunted  part  of  the  castle,  where  his  parents 
reveal  to  him  in  a  dream  things  which  he  is 
later  able  to  prove  legally.  He  learns  the  truth 
about  his  birth,  comes  into  his  estate,  and  wins 
the  lady  of  his  heart.  When  he  returns  to  the 
castle  as  its  master,  all  the  doors  fly  open 
through  the  agency  of  unseen  hands  to  welcome 
their  feudal  lord. 

The  characters  of  both  these  novels  are  with- 
out interest,  and  the  mysterious  element  fails 
to  produce  the  slightest  creepy  thrill. 

Twelve  years  passed  before  Walpole's  novel 
found  another  imitator  in  Mrs.  Ann  Radcliffe, 
who  so  far  excelled  her  two  predecessors  that 
she  has  been  called  the  founder  of  the  Gothic 
romance,  and  in  this  field  she  remains  without 
a  peer.  In  her  first  novel,  The  Castles  of  Athlin 
and  Dunbayne,  as  in  The  Old  English  Baron  by 
Clara  Reeve,  a  peasant  renowned  for  his  courage 
and  virtue  loves  and  is  beloved  by  a  lady  of  rank. 
A  strawberry  mark  on  his  arm  proves  that  he  is 
the  Baron  Malcolm  and  owner  of  the  castle  of 
Dunbayne,  at  which  juncture  amid  great  re- 
joicings the  story  ends. 

The  characters  and  the  style  foreshadow  Mrs. 


90      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Radcliffe's  later  work.  The  usurping  Baron 
of  Dunbayne,  who  has  imprisoned  in  his  castle 
the  women  who  might  oppose  his  ambition; 
the  two  melancholy  widows;  their  gentle  and 
pensive  daughters;  their  brave,  loyal,  and 
virtuous  sons  in  love  respectively  with  the 
two  daughters;  the  Count  Santmorin,  bold  and 
passionate,  who  endeavours  by  force  to  carry 
off  the  woman  he  loves — these  are  types  that 
Mrs.  Radcliffe  repeatedly  developed  until  in 
her  later  novels  they  became  real  men  and 
women  with  strong  conflicting  emotions. 

But  superior  to  all  her  other  powers  is  her 
ability  to  awaken  a  feeling  of  the  presence  of 
the  supernatural.  The  castle  of  Dunbayne  has 
secret  doors  and  subterranean  passages.  The 
mysterious  sound,  as  of  a  lute,  is  wafted  on  the 
air  from  an  unknown  source.  Alleyn,  in  en- 
deavouring to  escape  through  a  secret  passage, 
stumbles  over  something  in  the  dark,  and,  on 
stooping  to  learn  what  it  is,  finds  the  cold 
hand  of  a  corpse  in  his  grasp.  This  dead  man 
has  nothing  to  do  with  the  story,  but  is  intro- 
duced merely  to  make  the  reader  shudder,  which 
Mrs.  Radcliffe  never  fails  to  do,  even  after  we 
have  learned  all  the  secrets  of  her  art.  We  learn 
later  in  the  book  how  the  corpse  happened  to  be 
left  here  unburied;  for  in  that  day  of  intense 
realism,  half-way  between  the  ancient  belief 
in  ghosts  and  the  modern  interest  in  mental 


Ann    Radcliffe  91 

suggestion,  every  occurrence  outside  the  known 
laws  of  physics  was  greeted  with  a  cynical 
smile.  But,  although  Mrs.  Radcliffe  always 
explains  the  mystery  in  her  books,  we  hold 
our  breath  whenever  she  designs  that  we 
shall. 

The  Sicilian  Romance,  The  Romance  of  the 
Forest,  The  Mysteries  of  Udolpho,  and  The 
Italian  were  written  and  published  during  the 
next  seven  years  and  each  one  shows  a  marked 
artistic  advance  over  its  predecessor.  With  the 
opening  paragraph  of  each,  we  are  carried  at 
once  into  the  land  of  the  unreal,  into  regions  of 
poetry  rather  than  of  prose.  Rugged  mountains 
with  their  concealed  valleys,  whispering  forests 
which  the  eye  cannot  penetrate,  Gothic  ruins 
with  vaulted  chambers  and  subterranean  pas- 
sages, are  the  scenes  of  her  stories;  while  event 
after  event  of  her  complicated  plot  happens 
either  just  as  the  mists  of  evening  are  obscuring 
the  sun,  or  while  the  moonlight  is  throwing 
fantastic  shadows  over  the  landscape.  It  is 
an  atmosphere  of  mystery  in  which  one  feels 
the  weird  presence  of  the  supernatural.  This 
is  heightened  by  the  ghostly  suggestions  she 
brings  to  the  mind,  as  incorporeal  as  spirits. 
A  low  hurried  breathing  in  the  dark,  lights 
flashing  out  from  unexpected  places,  forms 
gliding  noiselessly  along  the  dark  corridors,  a 
word  of  warning  from  an  unseen  source,  cause 


92 


Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 


the  reader  to  wait  with  hushed  attention  for  the 
unfolding  of  the  mystery. 

Sometimes  the  solution  is  trivial.  The  reader 
and  the  inmates  of  Udolpho  are  held  in  suspense 
chapter  after  chapter  by  some  terrible  appear- 
ance behind  a  black  veil.  When  Emily  ventures 
to  draw  the  curtain,  she  drops  senseless  to  the 
ground.  But  this  appearance  turns  out  to  be 
merely  a  wax  effigy  placed  there  by  chance. 
Often  the  explanation  is  more  satisfactory. 
The  disappearance  of  Ludovico  during  the 
night  from  the  haunted  chamber  where  he  was 
watching  in  hopes  of  meeting  the  spirits  that 
infested  it,  makes  the  most  sceptical  believe  for 
a  time  in  the  reality  of  the  ghostly  visitants ;  and 
his  reappearance  at  the  close  of  the  book,  the 
slave  of  pirates  who  had  found  a  secret  passage 
leading  from  the  sea  to  this  room,  and  had  used 
it  as  a  place  of  rendezvous,  is  declared  by  Sir 
Walter  Scott  to  meet  all  the  requirements  of 
romance. 

But  by  a  series  of  strange  coincidences  and 
dreams  Mrs.  Radcliffe  still  makes  us  feel  that 
the  destiny  of  her  characters  is  shaped  by  an  un- 
seen power.  Adeline  is  led  by  chance  to  the 
very  ruin  where  her  unknown  father  had  been 
murdered  years  before.  She  sees  in  dreams  all 
the  incidents  of  the  deed,  and  a  manuscript 
he  had  written  while  in  the  power  of  his  ene- 
mies falls  into  her  hands.  Again  by  chance  she 


Ann    Radcliffe 


93 


finds  an  asylum  in  the  home  of  a  clergyman, 
Arnaud  La  Luc,  who  proves  to  be  the  father 
of  her  lover,  Theodore  Peyrou.  It  seems  to  be 
by  the  interposition  of  Providence  that  Ellena 
finds  her  mother  and  is  recognised  by  her  father. 
So  in  every  tale  we  are  made  aware  of  powers 
not  mortal  shaping  human  destiny. 

Mrs.  Radcliffe  adds  to  this  consciousness  of 
the  presence  of  the  supernatural  by  another,  per- 
haps more  legitimate,  method.  She  felt  what 
Wordsworth  expressed  in  T intern  Abbey,  writ- 
ten the  year  after  her  last  novel  was  published : 

And  I  have  felt 

A  presence  that  disturbs  me  with  the  joy 
Of  elevated  thoughts;  a  sense  sublime 
Of  something  far  more  deeply  interfused, 
Whose  dwelling  is  the  light  of  setting  suns, 
And  the  round  ocean  and  the  living  air, 
And  the  blue  sky,  and  in  the  mind  of  man; 
A  motion  and  a  spirit,  that  impels 
All  thinking  things,  all  objects  of  all  thought, 
And  rolls  through  all  things. 

Mrs.  Radcliffe  seldom  loses  her  feeling  for  na- 
ture, and  has  a  strong  sense  of  the  effect  of 
environment  on  her  characters.  Julia,  when 
in  doubt  about  the  fate  of  Hippolitus,  often 
walked  in  the  evening  under  the  shade  of 
the  high  trees  that  environed  the  abbey.  "The 
dewy  coolness  of  the  air  refreshed  her.  The 
innumerable  roseate  tints  which  the  parting 


94      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

sun-beams  reflected  on  the  rocks  above,  and  the 
fine  vermil  glow  diffused  over  the  romantic 
scene  beneath,  softly  fading  from  the  eye  as  the 
night  shades  fell,  excited  sensations  of  a  sweet 
and  tranquil  nature,  and  soothed  her  into  a 
temporary  forgetfulness  of  her  sorrow."  As  the 
happy  lovers,  Vivaldi  and  Ellena,  are  gliding 
along  the  Bay  of  Naples,  they  hear  from  the 
shore  the  voices  of  the  vine-dressers,  as  they 
repose  after  the  labours  of  the  day,  and  catch 
the  strains  of  music  from  fishermen  who  are 
dancing  on  the  margin  of  the  sea. 

Sometimes  nature  is  prophetic.  The  whole 
description  of  the  castle  of  Udolpho,  when 
Emily  first  beholds  it,  is  symbolical  of  the 
sufferings  she  is  to  endure  there:  "As  she 
gazed,  the  light  died  away  on  its  walls,  leaving 
a  melancholy  purple  tint,  which  spread  deeper 
and  deeper,  as  the  thin  vapour  crept  up  the 
mountain,  while  the  battlements  above  were  still 
tipped  with  splendour.  From  these,  too,  the 
rays  soon  faded,  and  the  whole  edifice  was 
invested  with  the  solemn  duskiness  of  evening. 
Silent,  lonely,  and  sublime  it  seemed  to  stand 
the  sovereign  of  the  scene,  and  to  frown  defiance 
on  all  who  dared  invade  its  solitary  reign." 
When  Emily  is  happy  in  the  peasant's  home  in 
the  valley  below,  she  lingers  at  the  casement 
after  the  sun  has  set:  "But  a  clear  moonlight 
that  succeeded  gave  to  the  landscape  what  time 


Ann    Radcliffe  95 

gives  to  the  scenes  of  past  life,  when  it  softens 
all  their  harsh  features,  and  throws  over  the 
whole  the  mellowing  shade  of  distant  contempla- 
tion." It  is  this  feeling  for  nature  as  a  constant 
presence  in  daily  life,  now  elating  the  mind  with 
joy,  now  awakening  a  sense  of  foreboding  or  in- 
spiring terror,  and  again  soothing  the  mind  to 
repose,  that  gives  to  her  books  a  permanent  hold 
upon  the  imagination  and  marks  their  author  as 
a  woman  of  genius. 

In  her  response  to  nature,  she  belongs  to  the 
Lake  School.  Scott  said  of  her:  ''Mrs.  Rad- 
cliffe has  a  title  to  be  considered  as  the  first 
poetess  of  romantic  fiction,  that  is,  if  actual 
rhythm  shall  not  be  deemed  essential  to  poetry." 
Mrs.  Smith  describes  nature  as  we  all  know  it, 
as  it  appears  on  the  canvasses  of  Constable  and 
Wilson.  Mrs.  Radcliffe's  descriptions  of  ideal 
and  romantic  nature  have  earned  for  her  the 
name  of  the  English  Salvator  Rosa. 

Mrs.  Radcliffe's  characters  are  not  without 
interest,  although  they  are  often  mere  types. 
All  her  heroes  and  heroines  are  ladies  and 
gentlemen  of  native  courtesy,  superior  edu- 
cation, and  accomplishments.  In  The  Mys- 
teries of  Udolpho  she  has  set  forth  the  education 
which  St.  Aubert  gave  to  his  daughter,  Emily: 
"St.  Aubert  cultivated  her  understanding  with 
the  most  scrupulous  care.  He  gave  her  a  general 
view  of  the  sciences,  and  an  exact  acquaintance 


g6      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

with  every  part  of  elegant  literature.  He  taught 
her  Latin  and  English,  chiefly  that  she  might 
understand  the  sublimity  of  their  best  poets. 
She  discovered  in  her  early  years  a  taste  for 
works  of  genius;  and  it  was  St.  Aubert's  princi- 
ple, as  well  as  his  inclination,  to  promote  every 
innocent  means  of  happiness.  '  A  well  informed 
mind,'  he  would  say,  'is  the  best  security 
against  the  contagion  of  vice  and  folly.'  " 

In  all  their  circumstances  her  characters  are 
well-bred.  This  type  has  been  nearly  lost  in  lit- 
erature, due,  perhaps,  to  the  minuter  study  of 
manners  and  the  analysis  of  character.  When  an 
author  surveys  his  ladies  and  gentlemen  through 
a  reading-glass,  and  points  the  finger  at  their 
oddities  and  pries  into  their  inmost  secrets,  even 
the  Chesterfields  become  awkward  and  clownish. 
But  Mrs.  Radcliffe,  like  Mrs.  Smith,  is  a  true 
gentlewoman,  and  speaks  of  her  characters  with 
the  delicate  respect  of  true  gentility.  Julia, 
Adeline,  Emily,  and  Ellena,  the  heroines  of  four 
of  her  books,  love  nature,  and  while  away  the 
melancholy  hours  by  playing  on  the  lute  or 
writing  poetry,  and  are,  moreover,  well  qualified 
to  have  charge  of  a  baronial  castle  and  its 
dependencies.  Her  heroes  are  worthy  of  her 
heroines.  As  they  are  generally  seen  in  the 
presence  of  ladies,  if  they  have  vices  there  is  no 
occasion  for  their  display. 

It  is  only  in  the  characters  of  her  villains 


Ann  Radcliffe  97 

that  good  and  evil  are  intertwined,  and  she 
awakens  our  sympathy  for  them  equally  with 
our  horror.  Monsieur  La  Motte,  a  weak  man 
in  the  power  of  an  unscrupulous  one,  is  the  best 
drawn  character  in  The  Romance  of  the  Forest. 
He  has  taken  Adeline  under  his  protection 
and  has  been  as  a  father  to  her.  But  before 
this  he  had  committed  a  crime  which  has  placed 
his  life  in  the  hands  of  a  powerful  marquis.  To 
free  himself  he  consents  to  surrender  Adeline 
to  the  marquis,  who  has  become  enamoured 
of  her  beauty,  hoping  by  the  sacrifice  of  her 
honour  to  save  his  own  life.  He  is  agitated  in 
the  presence  of  Adeline,  and  trembles  at  the 
approach  of  any  stranger.  Scott  said  of  him, 
"  He  is  the  exact  picture  of  the  needy  man  who 
has  seen  better  days." 

In  The  Italian,  Schedoni,  a  monk  of  the  order 
of  Black  Penitents  for  whom  the  novel  is  named, 
is  guilty  of  the  most  atrocious  crimes  in  order 
that  he  may  further  his  own  ambition,  but  he  is 
not  devoid  of  natural  feeling.  Scott  says  the 
scene  in  which  he  "is  in  the  act  of  raising  his 
arm  to  murder  his  sleeping  victim,  and  discovers 
her  to  be  his  own  child,  is  of  a  new,  grand,  and 
powerful  character;  and  the  horrors  of  the 
wretch  who,  on  the  brink  of  murder,  has  just 
escaped  from  committing  a  crime  of  yet  more 
exaggerated  horror,  constitute  the  strongest 
painting  which  has  been  produced  by  Mrs. 


98      Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Radcliffe's  pencil,  and  form  a  crisis  well  fitted 
to  be  actually  embodied  on  canvas  by  some 
great  master." 

Every  book  has  one  or  more  gloomy,  deep- 
plotting  villains.  But  all  the  people  of  rank 
bear  unmistakable  marks  of  their  nobility,  even 
when  their  natures  have  become  depraved  by 
crime.  In  this  she  is  the  equal  of  Scott. 

In  every  ruined  abbey  and  castle  there  is  a 
servant  who  brings  in  a  comic  element  and  re- 
lieves the  strained  feelings.  Peter,  Annette,  and 
Paulo  are  all  faithful  but  garrulous,  and  often 
bring  disaster  upon  their  masters  by  overzeal 
in  their  service. 

When  Vivaldi,  the  hero  of  The  Italian,  is 
brought  before  the  tribunal  of  the  inquisition, 
his  faithful  servant,  Paulo,  rails  bitterly  at  the 
treatment  his  master  has  received.  Vivaldi, 
well  knowing  the  danger  which  they  both  incur 
by  too  free  speech,  bids  him  speak  in  a  whisper: 

'"A  whisper,'  shouted  Paulo, ' I  scorn  to  speak 
in  a  whisper.  I  will  speak  so  loud  that  every 
word  I  say  shall  ring  in  the  ears  of  all  those 
old  black  devils  on  the  benches  yonder,  ay, 
and  those  on  that  mountebank  stage,  too,  that 
sit  there  looking  so  grim  and  angry,  as  if  they 
longed  to  tear  us  in  pieces.  They — ' 

"  '  Silence,'  said  Vivaldi  with  emphasis.  ' Paulo, 
I  command  you  to  be  silent.' 

'"They  shall  know  a  bit  of  my  mind,'  contin- 


Ann  Radcliffe 


99 


ued  Paulo,  without  noticing  Vivaldi.  '  I  will  tell 
them  what  they  have  to  expect  from  all  their 
cruel  usage  of  my  poor  master.  Where  do 
they  expect  to  go  to  when  they  die,  I  wonder? 
Though  for  that  matter,  they  can  scarcely  go 
to  a  worse  place  than  that  they  are  in  already, 
and  I  suppose  it  is  knowing  that  which  makes 
them  not  afraid  of  being  ever  so  wicked.  They 
shall  hear  a  little  plain  truth  for  once  in  their 
lives,  however;  they  shall  hear — '  ' 

But  by  this  time  Paulo  is  dragged  from  the 
room. 

The  plots  of  all  Mrs.  RadcliftVs  novels  are 
complicated.  A  whole  skein  is  knotted  and 
must  be  unravelled  thread  by  thread.  The 
Mysteries  of  Udolpho  is  the  most  involved. 
Characters  are  introduced  that  are  for  a  time 
apparently  forgotten;  one  sub-plot  appears 
within  another,  but  at  the  end  each  is  found 
necessary  to  the  whole. 

The  Italian  is  simpler  than  the  others:  the 
plot  is  less  involved,  and  there  are  many  strong 
situations.  The  opening  sentence  at  once 
arouses  the  interests  of  the  reader:  "Within 
the  shade  of  the  portico,  a  person  with  folded 
arms,  and  eyes  directed  towards  the  ground, 
was  pacing  behind  the  pillars  the  whole  ex- 
tent of  the  pavement,  and  was  apparently  so 
engaged  by  his  own  thoughts  as  not  to  ob- 
serve that  strangers  were  approaching.  He 


ioo    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

turned,  however,  suddenly,  as  if  startled  by 
the  sound  of  steps,  and  then,  without  fur- 
ther pausing,  glided  to  a  door  that  opened 
into  the  church,  and  disappeared."  Another 
scene  in  which  the  Marchesa  Vivaldi  and  Sche- 
doni  are  plotting  the  death  of  Ellena,  is  justly 
famous.  The  former  is  actuated  by  the  desire 
to  prevent  her  son's  marriage  to  a  woman  of 
inferior  rank ;  the  latter  hopes  that  he  may  gain 
an  influence  over  the  powerful  Marchesa  that 
will  lead  to  his  promotion  in  the  church.  Their 
conference,  which  takes  place  in  the  choir  of 
the  convent  of  San  Nicolo,  is  broken  in  upon 
by  the  faint  sound  of  the  organ  followed  by 
slow  voices  chanting  the  first  requiem  for  the 
dead. 

The  Italian  is  generally  considered  the  strong- 
est of  Mrs.  Radcliffe's  novels.  It  was  pub- 
lished in  1797,  and  was  as  enthusiastically 
received  as  were  its  predecessors,  but  for  some 
reason  it  was  the  last  book  Mrs.  Radcliffe  pub- 
lished. Neither  the  fame  it  brought  her,  nor 
the  eight  hundred  pounds  she  received  for  it 
from  her  publishers,  tempted  its  author  from 
her  life  of  retirement.  Publicity  was  distaste- 
ful to  her.  At  the  age  of  thirty-four,  at  an  age 
when  many  novelists  had  written  nothing,  she 
ceased  from  writing,  and  spent  the  rest  of  her 
years  either  in  travel  or  in  the  seclusion  of  her 
own  home. 


Ann    Radcliffe  101 

The  novel  at  this  time  was  not  considered 
seriously  as  a  work  of  art,  and  Mrs.  Radclifle 
may  have  considered  that  she  was  but  trifling 
with  time  by  employing  her  pen  in  that  way. 
In  looking  over  the  book  reviews  in  The  Gentle- 
men's Magazine  for  the  years  from  1790  to  1800, 
it  is  significant  that,  while  column  after  column 
is  spent  in  lavish  praise  of  a  book  of  medicine 
or  science  which  the  next  generation  proved 
to  be  false,  and  of  poetry  that  had  no  merit 
except  that  its  feet  could  be  counted,  seldom 
is  a  novel  reviewed  in  its  pages.  The  Mysteries 
of  Udolpho  was  criticised  for  its  lengthy  de- 
scriptions, and  The  Italian  was  ignored. 

The  direct  influence  of  these  novels  on  the 
literature  of  the  nineteenth  century  cannot 
be  estimated.  Mrs.  Radcliffe's  influence  upon 
her  contemporaries  can  be  more  easily  traced. 
The  year  after  the  publication  of  The  Mysteries 
of  Udolpho  Lewis  wrote  The  Monk.  This  has 
all  the  horrors  but  none  of  the  refined  delicacy 
of  Mrs.  Radclifle's  work.  Robert  Charles  Maturin 
borrowed  many  suggestions  from  her,  and  the 
gentle  satire  of  Northanger  Abbey  could  never 
have  been  written  if  Jane  Austen  had  not  her- 
self come  under  the  influence  of  The  Romance  of 
the  Forest. 

But  her  greatest  influence  was  upon  Scott. 
The  four  great  realistic  novelists  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  Richardson,  Fielding,  Smollett  and 


102    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Sterne  whose  influence  can  be  so  often  traced 
in  Thackeray  and  Dickens,  seem  never  to  have 
touched  the  responsive  nature  of  Scott.  He 
edited  their  works  and  often  spoke  in  their 
praise,  but  that  which  was  deepest  and  truest  in 
him,  which  gave  birth  to  his  poetry  and  his 
novels,  seems  never  to  have  been  aware  of  their 
existence.  Mrs.  Radcliffe  and  Maria  Edgewood 
were  his  most  powerful  teachers. 

Andrew  Lang  in  the  introduction  to  Rob  Roy 
in  the  Border  edition  of  the  Waverley  Novels 
calls  attention  to  the  fact  that  Waverley,  Guy 
Mannering,  Lovel  of  The  Antiquary,  and  Frank 
Osbaldistone  were  all  poets.  Not  only  these 
men,  but  others,  as  Edward  Glendinning  and 
Edgar  Ravenswood,  bear  a  strong  family 
resemblance  to  Theodore  Peyrou,  Valancourt, 
and  Vivaldi,  as  well  as  to  some  of  the  other  less 
important  male  characters  in  Mrs.  Radcliffe 's 
novels.  Scott's  men  stand  forth  more  clearly 
drawn,  while  Mrs.  Radcliffe's  are  often  but  dimly 
outlined.  Ellen  Douglas,  the  daughter  of  an  ex- 
iled family;  the  melancholy  Flora  Maclvor,  who 
whiled  away  her  hours  by  translating  High- 
land poetry  into  English ;  Mary  Avenel,  dwelling 
in  a  remote  castle,  are  all  refined,  educated 
gentlewomen  such  as  Mrs.  Smith  and  Mrs. 
Radcliffe  delighted  in,  and  are  placed  in  situa- 
tions similar  to  those  in  which  Julia,  Adeline, 
and  Emily  are  found. 


Ann    Radcliffe  103 

But  the  heroines  of  Mrs.  Smith  and  Mrs. 
Radcliffe  have  a  quality  which  not  even  Scott 
has  been  able  to  give  to  his  women.  It  is 
expressed  by  a  word  often  used  during  the  reign 
of  the  Georges,  but  since  gone  out  of  fashion. 
They  were  women  of  fine  sensibilities.  Johnson 
defines  this  as  quickness  of  feeling,  and  it  has 
been  used  to  mean  a  quickness  of  perception 
of  the  soul  as  distinguished  from  the  intellect. 
The  sensibilities  of  women  may  not  be  finer 
than  those  of  men,  but  they  respond  to  a  greater 
variety  of  emotions.  This  gives  to  them  a  certain 
evanescent  quality  which  we  find  in  Elizabeth 
Bennet,  Jane  Eyre,  Maggie  Tulliver,  Romola,  the 
portraits  of  Madame  Le  Brun  and  Angelica 
Kauffman,  and  the  poetry  of  Elizabeth  Barrett 
Browning.  This  quality  men  have  almost  never 
grasped  whether  working  with  the  pen  or  the 
brush.  Rosalind,  Juliet,  Viola,  Beatrice,  all  pos- 
sess it;  and  in  a  less  degree,  Diana  of  the  Cross- 
ways  is  true  to  her  sex  in  this  respect.  But  the 
features  of  nearly  every  famous  Madonna,  no 
matter  how  skilful  the  artist  that  painted  her, 
are  stiff  and  wooden  when  looked  at  from  this 
point  of  view,  and  Scott's  heroines,  with  the 
possible  exception  of  Jeanie  Deans,  are  immobile 
when  compared  with  woman  as  portrayed  by 
many  an  inferior  artist  of  her  own  sex. 

Scott's  complicated  plots  and  his  constant 
introduction  of  characters  who  are  surrounded 


104    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

by  mystery  or  are  living  in  disguise  again  sug- 
gest Mrs.  Radcliffe.  Again  and  again  he  selected 
the  same  scenes  that  had  appealed  to  her,  and 
in  his  earlier  novels  and  poems  he  filled  them  in 
with  the  same  details  which  she  had  chosen. 
Perhaps  it  is  due  to  her  influence  that  all  the 
hills  of  Scotland,  as  some  critic  has  observed, 
become  mountains  when  he  touches  them: 
"The  sun  was  nearly  set  behind  the  distant 
mountain  of  Liddesdale"  was  the  beginning 
of  an  early  romance  to  have  been  entitled 
Thomas  the  Rhymer.  Knockwinnock  Bay  in 
The  Antiquary  is  first  seen  at  sunset,  and 
it  is  night  when  Guy  Mannering  arrives  at 
Ellangowan  Castle.  Melrose  is  described  by 
moonlight.  The  sun  as  it  sets  in  the  Trossachs 
brings  to  the  mind  of  Scott  the  very  outlines 
and  colours  which  Mrs.  Radcliffe  had  used  in 
giving  the  first  appearance  of  Udolpho,  a  scene 
which  Scott  has  highly  praised;  -while  these 
famous  lines  of  James  Fit z- James  have  caught 
the  very  essence  of  one  of  her  favourite 
spots : 

On  this  bold  brow,  a  lordly  tower; 

In  that  soft  vale,  a  lady's  bower; 

On  yonder  meadow,  far  away, 

The  turrets  of  a  cloister  grey! 

How  blithely  might  the  bugle  horn 

Chide,  on  the  lake,  the  lingering  morn  I 

How  sweet,  at  eve,  the  lover's  lute 

Chime,  when  the  groves  were  Still  and  mutel 


Harriet  and  Sophia  Lee       105 

And,  when  the  midnight  moon  should  lave 
Her  forehead  in  the  silver  wave, 
How  solemn  on  the  ear  would  come 
The  holy  matin's  distant  hum. 

In  his  later  works  Scott  is  tediously  prosaic 
in  description,  far  inferior  to  Mrs.  Radcliffe, 
and  in  the  romantic  description  of  scenery  he 
never  excels  her.  It  would  seem  to  be  no  mere 
chance  that  in  his  poetry  and  in  his  earlier  nov- 
els he  has  so  often  struck  the  same  key  as  did 
the  author  of  The  Mysteries  of  Udolpho. 

Two  sisters,  Harriet  and  Sophia  Lee,  were 
writing  books  and  finding  readers  during  the 
time  of  Mrs.  Smith,  Mrs.  Inchbald,  and  Mrs. 
Radcliffe.  In  1784,  Sophia  Lee  published  a 
three- volume  novel,  The  Recess,  a  story  of  the 
time  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  in  which  Elizabeth, 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  and  the  earls  Leicester, 
Norfolk,  and  Essex  play  important  roles.  The 
two  heroines  are  unacknowledged  daughters  of 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots  and  Norfolk,  to  whom 
she  has  been  secretly  married  during  her  im- 
prisonment in  England.  Many  other  situations 
in  the  book  are  equally  fictitious. 

The  historical  novels  written  in  France  during 
the  reign  of  Louis  XIV  paid  no  heed  to  chro- 
nology, but  men  and  women  whom  the  author 
knew  well  were  dressed  in  the  garb  of  historical 
personages,  and  various  periods  of  the  past  were 


106    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

brought  into  the  space  of  the  story.  The  Re- 
cess was  not  a  masquerade,  but  the  plot  and 
characters  slightly  picture  the  reign  of  Elizabeth. 
This  was  one  of  the  first  novels  in  which  there 
was  an  attempt  to  represent  a  past  age  with 
something  like  accuracy.  As  this  was  one 
of  the  first  historical  novels,  using  the  term 
in  the  modern  sense,  it  had  perhaps  a  right  to  be 
one  of  the  poorest;  for  it  is  impossible  to  con- 
ceive three  volumes  of  print  in  which  there  are 
fewer  sentences  that  leave  any  impress  on  the 
mind  than  this  once  popular  novel. 

Sophia  Lee  wrote  other  novels  which  are  said 
to  be  worse  than  this;  but  in  1797  she  and  her 
sister  Harriet,  who  had  the  greater  imagina- 
tion, published  The  Canterbury  Tales.  Some  of 
those  written  by  Harriet  are  excellent.  Ac- 
cording to  the  story  a  group  of  travellers  have 
met  at  an  inn  in  Canterbury,  where  they  are 
delayed  on  account  of  a  heavy  fall  of  snow. 
To  while  away  the  weary  hours  of  waiting,  as 
they  are  gathered  about  the  fire  in  true  English 
fashion,  they  agree,  as  did  the  Canterbury  pil- 
grims of  long  ago,  that  each  one  shall  tell  a  story. 
But  the  pilgrims  whom  Chaucer  accompanied 
to  the  shrine  of  Thomas  a  Becket  are  accurately 
described,  and  between  the  tales  they  discuss 
the  stories  and  exchange  lively  banter  in  which 
the  nature  of  each  speaker  is  clearly  revealed. 
In  The  Canterbury  Tales  there  is  little  character- 


Harriet  and  Sophia  Lee       107 

drawing.  Any  one  of  the  stories  might  have 
been  told  by  any  one  of  the  narrators,  and  before 
the  conclusion  the  authors  dropped  this  device. 

In  the  stories  that  are  told  the  characters 
are  weak,  but  the  plots  are  interesting  and 
many  of  them  original  and  clever.  These  Tales 
represent  the  beginning  of  the  modern  short 
story. 

In  a  preface  to  a  complete  edition  of  the 
Tales  published  in  1832,  Harriet  Lee  wrote: 

"  Before  I  finally  dismiss  the  subject,  I  think 
I  may  be  permitted  to  observe  that,  when  these 
volumes  first  appeared,  a  work  bearing  dis- 
tinctly the  title  of  Tales,  professedly  adapted 
to  different  countries,  and  either  abruptly  com- 
mencing with,  or  breaking  suddenly  into,  a  sort 
of  dramatic  dialogue,  was  a  novelty  in  the  fiction 
of  the  day.  Innumerable  Tales  of  the  same 
stamp,  and  adapted  in  the  same  manner  to  all 
classes  and  all  countries,  have  since  appeared; 
with  many  of  which  I  presume  not  to  compete 
in  merit,  though  I  think  I  may  fairly  claim 
priority  of  design  and  style." 

The  Canterbury  Tales  were  read  and  reread  a 
long  time  after  they  were  written.  A  critic  in 
Blackwood's  says  of  them: 

"They  exhibit  more  of  that  species  of  in- 
vention which,  as  we  have  already  remarked, 
was  never  common  in  English  literature  than 
any  of  the  works  of  the  first-rate  novelists 


io8    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

we  have  named,  with  the  single  exception  of 
Fielding." 

The  most  famous  story  of  the  collection  is 
Kruitzener,  or  the  German's  Tale.  Part  of  the 
story  is  laid  in  Silesia  during  the  Thirty  Years' 
War.  Frederick  Kruitzener,  a  Bohemian,  is 
the  hero,  if  such  a  term  may  be  used  for  so  weak 
a  man.  In  his  youth  he  is  thus  described: 

"The  splendour,  therefore,  which  the  united 
efforts  of  education,  fortune,  rank,  and  the 
merits  of  his  progenitors  threw  around  him, 
was  early  mistaken  for  a  personal  gift — a  sort 
of  emanation  proceeding  from  the  lustre  of  his 
own  endowments,  and  for  which,  as  he  believed, 
he  was  indebted  to  nature,  he  resolved  not  to  be 
accountable  to  man.  .  .  .  He  was  distinguished! 
— he  saw  it — he  felt  it — he  was  persuaded  he 
should  ever  be  so ;  and  while  yet  a  youth  in  the 
house  of  his  father — dependent  on  his  paternal 
affection,  and  entitled  to  demand  credit  of  the 
world  merely  for  what  he  was  to  be — he  secretly 
looked  down  on  that  world  as  made  only  for 
him." 

The  tale  traces  the  troubles  which  Kruitzener 
brings  upon  himself,  his  misery  and  his  death. 
It  belongs  to  romantic  literature;  the  mountain 
scenes,  a  palace  with  secret  doors,  a  secret  gal- 
lery, a  false  friend,  a  mysterious  murder,  all  these 
remind  us  of  Mrs.  Radcliffe's  novels,  but  the 
story  does  not  possess  her  power  or  her  poetic 


Harriet  and  Sophia  Lee       109 

charm.  Ernest  Hartley  Coleridge  said  of  this 
tale:  "  But  the  motif — a  son  predestined  to  evil 
by  the  weakness  and  sensuality  of  his  father,  a 
father's  punishment  for  his  want  of  rectitude 
by  the  passionate  criminality  of  his  son,  is  the 
very  key-note  of  tragedy. " 

Byron  read  this  story  when  he  was  about 
fourteen,  and  it  affected  him  powerfully.  By 
a  strange  coincidence  Kruitzener  bears  a  strong 
resemblance  to  Lord  Byron  himself.  He  was 
proud  and  melancholy,  and,  while  he  led  a  life 
of  pleasure,  his  spirits  were  always  wrapped  in 
gloom.  "It  made  a  deep  impression  on  me," 
writes  Byron,  "  and  may,  indeed,  be  said  to 
contain  the  germ  of  much  that  I  have  since 
written."  In  1821,  he  dramatised  it  under  the 
title  of  Werner,  or  the  Inheritance.  The  play 
follows  the  novel  closely  both  in  plot  and  con- 
versation. An  editor  of  Byron's  works  wrote 
of  it:  "There  is  not  one  incident  in  his  play, 
not  even  the  most  trivial,  that  is  not  in  Miss 
Lee's  novel.  And  then  as  to  the  characters — 
not  only  is  every  one  of  them  to  be  found  in 
Kruitzener,  but  every  one  is  there  more  fully 
and  powerfully  developed." 

The  Landlady's  Tale  is  far  superior  to  all 
others  in  the  collection,  if  judged  by  present- 
day  standards.  This  story  of  sin  and  its  pun- 
ishment reminds  one  in  its  moral  earnestness 
of  George  Eliot.  Mr.  Mandeville  had  brought 


no    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

ruin  upon  a  poor  girl,  Mary  Lawson,  whose  own 
child  died,  when  she  became  the  wet  nurse  of 
Robert,  Mr.  Mandeville's  legitimate  son  and 
heir.  Mary  grew  to  love  the  boy,  but,  when 
the  father  threatened  to  expose  her  character 
unless  she  would  continue  to  be  his  mistress, 
she  ran  away,  taking  the  infant  with  her.  She 
became  a  servant  in  a  lodging-house  in  Wey- 
mouth,  where  she  lived  for  fifteen  years,  re- 
spected and  beloved.  At  the  end  of  that  time, 
Mr.  Mandeville  came  to  the  house  as  a  lodger, 
where  he  neither  recognised  Mary  nor  knew  his 
son.  But  he  disliked  Robert,  and  paid  no  heed 
to  the  fact  that  one  of  his  own  servants  was 
leading  the  boy  into  evil  ways.  When  Robert 
was  accused  of  a  crime  which  his  own  servant 
had  committed,  he  saw  him  sent  to  prison 
and  later  transported  with  indifference.  The 
grief  of  the  father  when  he  learned  that  Robert 
was  his  own  child  was  most  poignant,  and  his 
unavailing  efforts  to  save  him  are  vividly  told. 
He  is  left  bowed  with  grief,  for  he  suffers  under 
the  double  penalty  of  "a  reproachful  world  and 
a  reproaching  conscience." 


CHAPTER  VII 

Maria  Edgeworth.     Lady  Morgan 

"  J\  /IY  real  name  is  Thady  Quirk,  though  in 
1 V 1  the  family  I  have  always  been  known 
by  no  other  than  '  honest  Thady';  afterward,  in 
the  time  of  Sir  Murtagh,  diseased,  I  remember 
to  hear  them  calling  me  '  old  Thady, '  and  now 
I  'm  come  to  '  poor  Thady. ' "  Thus  the  faithful 
servant  of  the  Rackrent  family  introduces  him- 
self, before  relating  the  history  of  the  lords  of 
the  castle,  where  he  and  his  had  lived  rent-free 
time  out  of  mind.  And  what  consummate  art 
Maria  Edgeworth  showed  in  her  first  novel, 
Castle  Rackrent,  in  letting  "poor  Thady"  ram- 
ble with  all  the  garrulity  of  old  age.  To  him, 
who  had  never  been  farther  than  a  day's  tramp 
from  the  castle,  there  was  nothing  in  the  world's 
history  but  it  and  its  owners.  No  servant  but 
an  Irish  servant  could  have  told  the  story  as  he 
did,  judging  the  characters  of  his  masters  with 
shrewd  wit  and  relating  their  worst  failings 
with  a  "God  bless  them." 

And  where  out  of  Ireland  could  Thady  have 
found  such  masters,  ready  to  spend  all  they 
in 


ii2    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

had  and  another  man's  too,  happy  and  free, 
and  dying  as  merrily  as  they  had  lived !  There 
was  Sir  Patrick,  who,  as  Thady  tells  us,  "  could 
sit  out  the  best  man  in  Ireland,  let  alone  the 
three  kingdoms";  Sir  Kit,  who  married  a  Jewess 
for  her  money;  and  Sir  Condy,  who  signed  away 
the  estate  rather  than  be  bothered  to  look  into 
his  steward's  accounts,  and  then  feigned  that  he 
was  dead  that  he  might  hear  what  his  friends 
said  of  him  at  the  wake.  But  he  soon  came 
to  life,  and  a  merry  time  they  had  of  it.  "  But  to 
my  mind,"  says  Thady,  "  Sir  Condy  was  rather 
upon  the  sad  order  in  the  midst  of  it  all,  not 
finding  there  was  such  a  great  talk  about  him- 
self after  his  death,  as  he  had  expected  to  hear." 
But  Thady  loved  his  master,  and  it  is  with 
genuine  grief  that  he  records  his  ultimate  death, 
and  with  simple  and  unconscious  wit  he  adds, 
"He  had  but  a  very  poor  funeral  after  all." 

In  The  Absentee,  the  manners  and  customs 
of  the  Irish  peasants  are  more  broadly  delin- 
eated than  in  Castle  Rackrent.  The  Absentee 
was  written  to  call  the  attention  of  the  Irish 
landlords  who  were  living  in  England  to  the 
wretched  condition  of  their  tenants  left  in 
the  power  of  unscrupulous  stewards.  Lord 
Colambre,  the  son  of  Lord  Clonbrony,  an  ab- 
sentee, visits  his  father's  estates,  which  he  has 
not  seen  for  many  years,  in  disguise,  and  goes 
among  the  peasants,  many  of  whom  are  in 


Maria   Edgeworth  113 

abject  poverty.  But  the  quick  generosity  of 
the  nation  speaks  in  the  poor  Widow  O 'Neil's 
"Kindly  welcome,  sir,"  with  which  she  opens 
the  door  to  the  unknown  lord,  and  its  enthusi- 
astic loyalty  in  the  joyful  acclamations  of  the 
peasants  when  he  reveals  himself  to  them, — 
a  scene  which  Macaulay  has  pronounced  the 
finest  in  literature  since  the  twenty-second  book 
of  the  Odyssey. 

Ennui  is  another  of  her  stories  of  Irish  life,  in 
which  the  supposed  Earl  of  Glenthorn,  after  a 
long  residence  in  England,  returns  to  his  Irish 
estates.  The  heroine  of  this  tale  is  the  old 
nurse,  Ellinor  O'Donoghoe.  As  the  nurses  of 
many  stories  are  said  to  have  done,  she  had  sub- 
stituted her  own  child  for  the  rightful  heir,  and 
was  frantic  with  joy  when  she  saw  him  the 
master  of  Glenthorn  Castle.  Her  devotion  to 
the  earl  is  pathetic,  and  her  secret  fears  of 
the  deception  she  had  practised  on  the  old 
earl  may  have  prompted  her  strange  speech 
that,  if  it  pleased  God,  she  would  like  to  die  on 
Christmas  Day,  of  all  days,  "  because  the  gates 
of  heaven  will  be  open  all  that  day;  and  who 
knows  but  a  body  might  slip  in  unbeknownst?" 
Ellinor  is  a  woman  of  many  virtues  and  many 
failings,  but  she  is  always  pure  Celt. 

How  well  contrasted  are  the  two  cousins, 
friends  of  Ormond,  Sir  Ulick  O 'Shane,  a  wily 
politician  and  a  member  of  Parliament,  and  Mr. 


ii4    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Cornelius  O'Shane,  King  of  the  Black  Islands, 
called  by  his  dependents  King  Corny.  The 
latter,  bluff,  generous,  brave,  open  as  the  day, 
is  yet  a  match  for  his  crafty  kinsman.  Sir 
Ulick's  visit  to  King  Corny  is  a  masterpiece. 
He  has  a  purpose  in  his  visit  and  a  secret  to 
guard,  which  King  Corny  is  watching  to  dis- 
cover. Sir  Ulick  has  been  bantering  his  kins- 
man on  the  old-fashioned  customs  observed  on 
his  estate  and  ridicules  his  method  of  ploughing: 
4  Your  team,  I  see,  is  worthy  of  your  tackle, ' 
pursued  Sir  Ulick.  'A  mule,  a  bull,  and  two 
lean  horses.  I  pity  the  foremost  poor  devil 
of  a  horse,  who  must  starve  in  the  midst  of 
plenty,  while  the  horse,  bull,  and  even  mule,  in 
a  string  behind  him,  are  all  plucking  and  mun- 
ging  away  at  their  hay  ropes.' 

"Cornelius  joined  in  Sir  Ulick's  laugh,  which 
shortened  its  duration. 

"  '  Tis  comical  ploughing,  I  grant,'  said  he, 
'but  still,  to  my  fancy,  anything  's  better  and 
more  profitable  nor  the  tragi-comic  ploughing 
you  practise  every  sason  in  Dublin.' 

11  'I?'  said  Sir  Ulick. 

" '  Ay,  you  and  all  your  courtiers,  ploughing 
the  half-acre,  continually  pacing  up  and  down 
that  castle-yard,  while  you  're  waiting  in  atten- 
dance there.  Every  one  to  his  own  taste,  but, 

"  *  If  there 's  a  man  on  earth  I  hate, 
Attendance  and  dependence  be  his  fate.'  " 


Maria    Edgeworth  115 

King  Corny  has  been  studying  his  diplomatic 
kinsman  carefully  to  learn  his  secret,  until  the 
wily  politician,  by  unnecessary  caution  in' guard- 
ing it,  overreaches  himself,  when  King  Corny 
exclaims  to  himself: 

"Woodcocked!  That  he  has,  as  I  foresaw 
he  would." 

While  the  trained  diplomat  murmurs  as  he 
takes  his  leave,  "All  's  safe." 

Native  wit  had  got  the  better  of  artful 
cunning. 

And  when  Sir  Ulick  dies  in  disgrace,  how 
pithy  is  the  remark  of  one  of  the  men,  as  he 
is  filling  in  the  grave: 

"  There  lies  the  making  of  an  excellent  gentle- 
man— but  the  cunning  of  his  head  spoiled  the 
goodness  of  his  heart." 

In  the  same  book,  how  generous  and  how 
Irish  is  Moriarty,  lying  on  the  brink  of  death, 
as  he  thinks  of  Ormond,  who  had  shot  him  in  a 
fit  of  passion  but  bitterly  repented  his  rash  deed : 

"  I  'd  live  through  all,  if  possible,  for  his  sake, 
let  alone  my  mudther's,  or  shister's  or  my  own — 
't  would  be  too  bad,  after  all  the  trouble  he  got 
these  two  nights,  to  be  dying  at  last,  and  hant- 
ing  him,  maybe,  whether  I  would  or  no." 

The  quick  kindness  which  so  often  twists 
an  Irishman's  tongue  is  humorously  illustrated 
in  the  Essay  on  Irish  Bulls,  which  Maria 
Edgeworth  and  her  father  wrote  together.  Mr. 


n6    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Phelim  O'Mooney,  disguised  as  Sir  John  Bull,  ac- 
cepts his  brother's  wager  that  he  cannot  remain 
four  days  in  England  without  the  country  of  his 
birth  being  discovered  eight  times.  Whenever 
his  speech  betrays  him,  it  is  the  result  of  his 
emotions.  When  he  sees  Bourke,  a  pugilist 
of  his  own  country,  overcome  by  an  English- 
man, he  cries  to  him  excitedly:  "How  are  you, 
my  gay  fellow?  Can  you  see  at  all  with  the 
eye  that  is  knocked  out?"  A  little  later,  in 
discussing  a  certain  impost  duty,  he  grows 
angry  and  exclaims:  "  If  I  had  been  the  English 
minister,  I  would  have  laid  the  dog-tax  upon 
cats."  The  humour  of  his  situation  increases 
to  a  climax,  so  that  the  fun  never  flags.  Such 
stories  as  this  in  which  the  wit  is  simply  spark- 
ling good-nature,  with  no  attempt  to  use  it  as 
a  weapon  against  frail  humanity  as  did  Fielding 
and  Thackeray,  or  to  produce  a  smile  by  exag- 
geration as  did  Dickens,  but  simply  bubbling 
fun,  as  free  from  guile  as  the  sun's  laughter  on 
Killarney,  show  that  Miss  Edgeworth  was  a 
comedian  of  the  first  rank.  Like  all  true  come- 
dians, she  is  also  strong  in  the  pathetic,  but  it 
is  the  Irish  pathos,  in  which  there  is  ever  a 
smile  amid  the  tears.  This  is  found  in  the  story 
of  the  return  of  Lady  Clonbrony  to  her  own  coun- 
try ;  the  fall  of  Castle  Rackrent ;  and  the  ruin  by 
their  sudden  splendour  of  the  family  of  Christy 
O'Donoghoe. 


Maria    Edgeworth  117 

Whenever  Miss  Edgeworth  writes  of  Ireland 
and  its  people,  her  pages  glow  with  the  inspira- 
tion of  genius.  There  is  no  exaggeration,  no 
caricature;  all  is  told  with  simple  truth.  It 
has  often  been  the  fate  of  novelists  whose  aim 
has  been  to  depict  the  manners  and  customs 
of  a  locality  to  win  the  ill-will  of  the  obscure 
people  they  have  brought  into  prominence. 
But  not  so  with  Maria  Edgeworth.  Her  family, 
although  originally  English,  had  been  settled 
for  two  hundred  years  in  Ireland.  She  loved 
the  country  and  always  wrote  of  it  with  a  loving 
pen.  Before  Castle  Rackrent  was  written,  Ire- 
land had  been  for  many  centuries  an  outcast 
in  literature,  known  only  for  her  blunders  and 
bulls.  But,  as  one  of  her  characters  says,  "An 
Irish  bull  is  always  of  the  head,  never  of  the 
heart . ' '  Even  though  her  characters  are  humor- 
ous, they  are  never  clowns.  All  the  men  have 
dignity,  and  all  the  women  grace.  She  gave 
them  a  respectable  place  in  literature. 

But  her  influence  was  felt  outside  of  Ireland. 
Old  Thady,  in  his  garrulous  description  of  the 
masters  of  Castle  Rackrent,  had  introduced  the 
first  national  novel,  in  which  the  avowed  object 
is  to  represent  traits  of  national  character. 
Patriotic  writers  in  other  countries  learned 
through  her  how  to  serve  their  own  land, 
and  she  was  one  of  the  many  influences 
which  led  to  the  writing  of  the  Waverley 


n8    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

novels.  Scott  says  in  the  preface  of  these 
books  : 

"  Without  being  so  presumptuous  as  to  hope 
to  emulate  the  rich  humour,  pathetic  tender- 
ness, and  admirable  tact  which  pervade  the  work 
of  my  accomplished  friend,  I  felt  that  some- 
thing might  be  attempted  for  my  own  country, 
of  the  same  kind  with  that  which  Miss  Edge- 
worth  so  fortunately  achieved  for  Ireland  — 
something  which  might  introduce  her  natives  to 
those  of  the  sister  kingdom  in  a  more  favour- 
able light  than  they  had  been  placed  hitherto, 
and  tend  to  procure  sympathy  for  their  virtues 
and  indulgence  for  their  foibles." 

As  the  reader  realises  the  power  of  Maria 
Edgeworth's  mind,  her  ability  to  describe  man- 
ners and  customs,  { 


depict  comic  and  tragic  scenes,  he  wislies  that 
her  father,  Richard  Lovell  Edgeworth,  ha4  not 
so  constantly  interfered  in  her  work,  and  in- 
sisted that  every  book  she  wrote  must  illustrate 
some  principle  of  education.  He  was  not  sin- 
gular in  this  respect.  Rousseau,  whom  he 
greatly  admired  at  one  time,  had  taught  edu- 
cational methods  by  a  novel.  Madame  de 
Genlis,  the  teacher  of  Louis  Philippe,  was 
writing  novels  that  were  celebrated  throughout 
Europe,  in  which  she  expounded  rules  for  the 
training  of  the  young.  Maria  Edgeworth,  with 
her  father  at  her  elbow,  never  lost  sight  of  the 


Maria  Edgeworth  119 

moral  of  her  tale.  Vivian,  in  the  story  of  that 
name,  was  so  weak  that  he  was  always  at 
the  mercy  of  the  artful.  Ormond's  passions 
led  him  into  trouble.  Beauclerc  was  almost 
ruined  by  his  foolish  generosity.  Lady  Dela- 
cour,  with  no  object  in  life  but  pleasure, 
cast  aside  her  own  happiness  that  she 
might  outshine  the  woman  she  hated.  Lady 
Clonbrony  squandered  her  fortune  and  health 
that  she  might  be  snubbed  by  her  social  su- 
periors. Mrs.  Beaumont  played  a  deep  diplo- 
matic game  in  her  small  circle  of  friends,  and 
finally  overreached  herself.  Lady  Cecilia,  the 
friend  of  Helen,  brought  sorrow  to  her  and 
infamy  upon  herself  by  her  duplicity.  In  the 
analysis  of  motive,  and  the  growth  of  Cecilia's 
wrong-doing  from  a  small  beginning,  the  book 
resembles  the  novels  of  George  Eliot.  But 
Maria  Edgeworth  could  not  know  her  own 
characters  as  she  otherwise  would,  because  the 
moral  was  always  uppermost.  When  Mrs. 
Inchbald  criticised  her  novel  Patronage,  she 
replied:  "Please  to  recollect,  we  had  our  moral 
to  work  out."  Mr.  Edgeworth,  in  his  preface 
to  Tales  of  Fashionable  Life,  thus  sets  forth 
his  daughter's  purpose: 

"  It  has  been  my  daughter's  aim  to  promote 
by  all  her  works  the  progress  of  education  from 
the  cradle  to  the  grave.  All  the  parts  of  this 
series  of  moral  fiction  bear  upon  the  faults  and 


120    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

excellencies  of  different  ages  and  classes;  and 
they  have  all  risen  from  that  view  of  society 
which  we  have  laid  before  the  public  in  more 
didactic  works  on  education." 

Such  a  method  of  writing  tended  to  kill  emo- 
tion, yet  emotion  breaks  out  at  times  with 
genuine  force,  and  always  has  a  true  ring.  This 
is  especially  true  in  the  Tales  of  Fashionable 
Life.  There  society  women  appear  cold  and 
heartless  in  the  drawing-room,  and  so  they 
have  generally  been  represented  in  fiction.  So 
Thackeray  regarded  them.  But  Maria  Edge- 
worth  followed  them  to  the  boudoir,  and  there 
reveals  beneath  the  laces  and  jewels  many  beau- 
tiful womanly  traits.  As  we  see  in  tale  after 
tale  true  feeling  welling  to  the  surface,  and 
then  choked  up  by  the  moral,  we  recognise  the 
pathetic  truth  that  Mr.  Edgeworth's  educational 
methods  were  fatal  to  genius. 

But  strong  emotion  sways  only  a  small  part 
of  the  lives  of  most  men  and  women.  "Were 
it  otherwise,  like  the  great  lyric  poets,  we  should 
all  die  young.  And  she  has  written  about  the 
common,  everyday,  prosaic  life  with  a  truth- 
fulness rarely  excelled. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  studies  in  a 
novel  is  to  observe  the  author's  view  of  life. 
With  the  exception  of  those  of  Mademoiselle  De 
ScudeVi  nearly  all  the  novels  of  French  women 
considered  love  as  the  ruling  passion  for  happi- 


Maria  Edge  worth  121 

ness  or  woe,  and  all  of  the  characters  were  under 
its  sway.  Even  Mademoiselle  De  Scude'ri  in  the 
preface  to  Ibrahim  announced  it  as  her  distinct 
purpose  that  all  her  heroes  were  to  be  ruled  by 
the  two  most  sublime  passions,  love  and  ambi- 
tion ;  but  she  was  a  humorist  and  unconsciously 
interested  her  readers  more  by  her  witty  descrip- 
tions of  people  than  by  the  loves  of  Cyrus  and 
Mandane.  But  this  passion  has  seldom  held  such 
an  exaggerated  place  in  the  stories  of  English 
women.  Maria  Edgeworth  in  particular  noticed 
that  men  and  women  were  actuated  by  many 
motives  or  passions.  A  large  income  or  a  title 
was  often  capable  of  inspiring  a  feeling  so  akin 
to  love  that  even  the  bosom  that  felt  its  glow 
was  unable  to  distinguish  the  difference.  Loss 
of  respect  could  kill  the  strongest  passion,  and 
some  of  her  heroines  have  even  remained  single, 
or  else  married  men  whom  at  first  they  had 
regarded  with  indifference,  rather  than  marry 
the  object  of  their  first  love  after  he  had  for- 
feited their  esteem.  Sometimes  the  tameness 
of  her  heroines  shocked  their  author.  While 
correcting  Belinda  for  Mrs.  Barbauld's  "Nov- 
elists' Library,"  Miss  Edgeworth  wrote  to  a 
friend : 

"I  really  was  so  provoked  with  the  cold 
tameness  of  that  stick  or  stone  Belinda,  that  I 
could  have  torn  the  pages  out." 

Propinquity,   opportunity,   almost  a  mental 


122    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

suggestion  are  quite  enough  to  produce  a  long 
chain  of  events  affecting  a  lifetime.  "Ask  half 
the  men  you  are  acquainted  with  why  they  are 
married,  and  their  answer,  if  they  speak  the 
truth,  will  be,  '  Because  I  met  Miss  Such-a-One 
at  such  a  place,  and  we  were  continually 
together.'  *  Propinquity,  propinquity,'  as  my 
father  used  to  say,  and  he  was  married  five 
times,  and  twice  to  heiresses."  So  speaks 
Mrs.  Broadhurst,  a  match-making  mother  in 
The  Absentee.  And  this  is  the  reason  why  most 
of  Miss  Edgeworth's  heroes  and  heroines  love. 
But  the  advances  of  a  designing  woman  are 
quite  sufficient,  as  in  Vivian,  to  make  a  fond 
lover  forget  his  plighted  troth  to  another,  and  the 
flattery  of  an  unscrupulous  man  makes  him  sus- 
picious of  his  real  friends.  Character  is  destiny, 
if  the  character  is  strong,  but  circumstances 
are  destiny,  if  the  character  is  weak.  It  is  the 
aim  of  her  novels  to  show  how  certain  traits 
of  character,  as  indecision,  pride,  love  of  luxury, 
indolence,  lead  to  misfortune,  and  how  these 
dangerous  traits  may  be  overcome. 

Notwithstanding  her  moral,  her  plots  are 
never  hackneyed  and  never  repeated.  They  are 
drawn  from  life  and  have  the  variety  of  life. 
In  the  story  of  Ennui,  there  is  the  twice-told 
tale  of  the  nurse's  son  substituted  for  the  real 
heir;  but  when  he  learns  the  true  story  of  his 


Maria  Edgeworth  123 

birth,  and  resigns  the  castle,  the  title,  and  all 
its  wealth  to  the  rightful  Earl  of  Glenthorn,  who 
has  been  living  in  the  village  working  at  the  forge, 
there  is  a  great  change  from  the  usual  story.  The 
heir  of  the  ancient  family  of  Glenthorn  accepts 
the  earldom  for  his  son,  but  with  reluctance.  The 
manners  of  the  peasant  remain  with  the  earl,  and 
the  poor  man,  at  last,  begs  the  one  who  has  been 
educated  for  the  position  to  accept  the  title  and 
the  estates.  In  this  she  emphasised  again  what 
she  constantly  taught,  that  education  and  envi- 
ronment are  more  powerful  than  heredity. 

As  she  taught  that  reason  should  be  the  guide 
of  life,  so  she  lived.  Her  fourscore  years  and 
three  were  spent  largely  at  her  ancestral  home 
of  Edgeworthstown.  She  assisted  her  father 
in  making  improvements  to  better  the  condition 
of  the  tenantry,  and  to  promote  their  happi- 
ness. When  in  Paris,  she  met  a  Mr.  Edelcrantz, 
a  gentleman  in  the  service  of  the  king  of  Sweden. 
Admiration  was  succeeded  by  love.  But  he 
could  not  leave  the  court  at  Stockholm,  and 
Miss  Edgeworth  felt  that  neither  duty  nor  incli- 
nation would  permit  her  to  leave  her  quiet  life 
in  Ireland.  Reason  was  stronger  than  love. 
So  they  parted  like  her  own  heroes  and  heroines. 
All  that  history  records  of  him  is  that  he  never 
married.  She  resumed  her  responsibilities  at 
home,  and  if  the  thought  of  this  separation 
sometimes  brought  the  tears  to  her  eyes,  as  her 


124    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

stepmother  once  wrote  to  a  friend,  she  was  as 
cheerful,  gay,  and  light-hearted  in  the  home 
circle  as  she  had  always  been. 

Besides  her  moral  tales  for  adults,  which  were 
read  throughout  Europe,  Maria  Edgeworth  was 
always  interested  in  the  education  of  boys  and 
girls.  The  eldest  sister  in  a  family  of  twenty- 
one  children,  the  offspring  of  four  marriages, 
she  taught  her  younger  brothers  and  sisters, 
and  thus  grew  to  know  intimately  the  needs 
of  childhood  and  what  stories  would  appeal 
to  them.  As  her  father  wrote,  it  was  her 
"aim  to  promote  by  all  her  works  the  progress 
of  education  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave." 
In  her  stories  for  children  she  inculcated  les- 
sons of  industry,  economy,  though  tfulness,  and 
unselfishness. 

If  she  helped  to  eradicate  from  the  novel  its 
false,  highly  colored  sentimental  pictures  of  life, 
still  greater  was  her  work  in  producing  liter- 
ature for  young  people.  Hers  were  among  the 
first  wholesome  stories  written  for  children. 
Before  this  the  chapman  had  carried  about  with 
him  in  his  pack  small  paper-covered  books 
which  warned  boys  and  girls  of  the  dangers 
of  a  life  of  crime.  One  book  was  named  An 
hundred  godly  lessons  which  a  mother  on  her 
death-bed  gave  to  her  children.  Another  book 
of  religious  and  moral  Sunday  reading  was 


Maria  Edge  worth  125 

called  The  Afflicted  Parent,  or  the  Undutiful 
Child  Punished.  This  gives  the  sad  history 
of  the  two  children  of  a  gentleman  in  Ches- 
ter, a  son  and  a  daughter.  The  daughter 
chided  her  brother  for  his  wickedness,  upon 
which  he  struck  her  and  killed  her.  He  was 
hanged  for  this,  but  even  then  his  punishment 
was  not  completed.  He  came  back  to  life, 
told  the  minister  several  wicked  deeds  which 
he  had  committed,  and  was  hanged  a  second 
time.  In  most  of  these  tales  the  gallows  loomed 
dark  and  threatening. 

In  contrast  to  these  morbid  tales  are  the 
wholesome  stories  of  Maria  Edgeworth.  The 
boys  and  girls  about  whom  she  writes  are  drawn 
from  life.  If  they  are  bad,  their  crimes  are 
never  enormous,  but  simply  a  yielding  to  the 
common  temptations  of  childhood.  Hal,  in 
Waste  Not,  Want  Not,  thinks  economy  beneath 
a  gentleman's  notice,  and  at  last  loses  a  prize 
in  an  archery  contest  for  lack  of  a  piece  of  string 
which  he  had  destroyed.  Fisher  in  The  Barring 
Out,  a  cowardly  boy,  buys  twelve  buns  for 
himself  with  a  half-crown  which  belonged  to  his 
friend,  and  then  gives  a  false  account  of  the 
money.  His  punishment  is  expulsion  from 
the  school.  Lazy  Lawrence  has  a  worse  fate. 
He  will  not  work,  plays  pitch  farthing,  is  led 
by  bad  companions  to  steal,  and  is  sent  to 


126    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Bridewell.  But  he  is  not  left  in  a  hopeless 
condition.  After  he  had  served  his  term  of  im- 
prisonment he  became  remarkable  for  his 
industry. 

But  there  are  more  good  boys  and  girls  than 
bad  ones  in  her  stories.  The  love  of  children 
for  their  parents,  and  the  sacrifices  they  will 
make  for  those  they  love,  are  beautifully  told. 
In  the  story  of  The  Orphans,  Mary,  a  girl  of 
twelve,  finds  a  home  for  her  brothers  and  sisters, 
after  her  father  and  mother  die,  in  the  ruins  of 
Rossmore  Castle,  where  they  support  them- 
selves by  their  labour.  Mary  finds  that  she 
can  make  shoes  of  cloth  with  soles  of  platted 
hemp,  and  by  this  industry  the  children  earn 
enough  for  all  their  needs.  As  directions  are 
given  for  making  these  shoes,  any  little  girl 
reading  the  story  would  know  how  to  follow 
the  example  of  Mary.  Jem  in  the  story  of 
Lazy  Lawrence  finds  that  there  are  many  ways 
by  which  he  can  earn  the  two  guineas  without 
which  his  horse  Lightfoot  must  be  sold.  He 
works  early  and  late,  and  at  last  accomplishes 
his  purpose. 

Mrs.  Ritchie  says  of  this  story:  "Lightfoot 
deserves  to  take  his  humble  place  among  the 
immortal  winged  steeds  of  mythology  along 
with  Pegasus,  or  with  Black  Bess,  or  Balaam's 
Ass,  or  any  other  celebrated  steeds. " 

The  story  of  Simple  Susan  with  its  pictures 


Maria  Edgeworth  127 

of  village  life  has  the  charm  of  an  idyl.  The 
children  by  the  hawthorn  bush  choosing  their 
May  Queen;  Susan  with  true  heroism  refusing 
this  honour,  in  order  that  she  may  care  for  her 
sick  mother;  the  incident  of  the  guinea-hen; 
Rose's  love  for  Susan;  the  old  harper,  playing 
tunes  to  the  children  grouped  about  him — are 
all  simply  told.  Susan's  love  for  her  pet  lamb 
reminds  one  of  Wordsworth's  poem  of  that 
name. 

And  yet  these  children  are  not  unusual. 
Most  boys  and  girls  have  days  when  they  are 
as  good  as  Mary,  or  Jem,  or  Susan.  Maria 
Edgeworth  is  not  inculcating  virtues  which  are 
impossible  of  attainment. 

A  hundred  years  ago,  these  stories,  as  they 
came  from  the  pen  of  Maria  Edgeworth,  de- 
lighted boys  and  girls,  and  for  at  least  fifty  years 
were  read  by  parents  and  children.  Then  for 
a  time  they  were  hidden  in  libraries,  but  a  col- 
lection of  them  has  lately  been  edited  by  Mr. 
Charles  Welsh  under  the  appropriate  title  Tales 
that  never  Die,  which  have  proved  as  interesting 
to  the  children  of  to-day  as  to  those  of  by- 
gone generations. 

Whether  Maria  Edgeworth  is  writing  for  old 
or  young,  there  is  one  marked  trait  in  all  her 
stories,  her  kind  feeling  for  all  humanity.  The 
vices  of  her  villains  are  recorded  in  a  tone  of 
sorrow.  She  seldom  uses  satire;  never  "makes 


128    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

fun"  of  her  characters.  Her  attitude  towards 
them  is  that  of  the  lady  of  Edgeworthstown 
towards  her  dependents,  or  rather  that  of  the 
elder  sister  towards  the  younger  members  of  the 
family.  Such  broad  and  loving  sympathy  ir 
found  in  Shakespeare  and  Scott,  but  seldom 
among  lesser  writers. 

In  Sydney  Owenson,  better  known  by  her 
married  name  of  Lady  Morgan,  Ireland  found 
at  this  time  another  warm  but  less  judicious 
friend.  Her  life  was  more  interesting  than  her 
books.  Her  father,  an  Irish  actor,  introduced 
his  daughter,  while  yet  a  child,  to  his  associates, 
so  that  she  appeared  in  society  at  an  early  age. 
But  Mr.  Owenson  was  improvident ;  debts  accu- 
mulated, and  Sydney  at  the  age  of  fourteen 
began  to  earn  her  own  living.  The  position 
of  a  governess,  which  she  filled  for  a  time,  being 
unsuited  to  her  gay,  independent  disposition, 
she  began  to  write.  Like  Johnson  a  half  cen- 
tury or  more  earlier,  with  a  play  in  manuscript 
as  her  most  valuable  possession,  she  went  alone 
to  London.  She  did  not  wait  so  long  as  he 
did  for  recognition.  New  books  by  new  authors 
were  eagerly  read.  She  earned  money,  a  social 
position,  fame,  and  with  ic  some  disagreeable 
notoriety.  An  independent,  witty  Irish  woman 
of  great  charm,  fearless  in  expressing  her  opin- 
ions, who  had  introduced  herself  into  society 


Lady  Morgan  129 

and  for  whom  nobody  stood  as  sponsor,  was 
looked  upon  by  the  old-fashioned  English 
aristocracy  as  an  adventuress;  and  later,  when 
she  came  forth  as  the  champion  of  Irish  liberties, 
and  upbraided  England  for  tyranny,  she  was 
maliciously  denounced  by  the  Tory  party. 

She  entered  upon  life  with  three  purposes,  to 
each  of  which  she  adhered:  to  advocate  the 
interest  of  Ireland  by  her  writings;  to  pay  her 
father's  debts;  and  to  provide  for  his  old  age. 
All  of  these  purposes  she  accomplished. 

Besides  plays  and  poems,  and  two  or  three 
insignificant  stories,  she  wrote  four  novels  upon 
Irish  subjects:  The  Wild  Irish  Girl,  O'Donnel, 
Florence  Macarthy,  and  The  O'Briens  and  the 
O'Flahertys.  In  all  these  books  the  beauty  of 
Irish  scenery  is  depicted  as  background;  the 
fashionable  life  of  Dublin  is  described,  as  well 
as  the  peasant  life  in  remote  hamlets;  while  the 
natural  resources  of  the  land  and  the  native 
gaiety  of  the  Celtic  temperament  are  feelingly 
contrasted  with  the  poverty  and  misery  brought 
about  by  unjust  laws. 

She  thus  feelingly  describes  the  condition  of 
Ireland  in  the  novel  O'Donnel.  Its  sincerity 
must  excuse  its  overwrought  style:  "Silence  and 
oblivion  hung  upon  her  destiny,  and  in  the 
memory  of  other  nations  she  seemed  to  hold 
no  place;  but  the  first  bolt  which  was  knocked 
off  her  chain  roused  her  from  paralysis,  and, 


130    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

as  link  fell  after  link,  her  faculties  strengthened, 
her  powers  revived;  she  gradually  rose  upon 
the  political  horizon  of  Europe,  like  her  own 
star  brightening  in  the  west,  and  lifting  its  light 
above  the  fogs,  vapours,  and  clouds,  which 
obscured  its  lustre.  The  traveller  now  beheld 
her  from  afar,  and  her  shores,  once  so  devoutly 
pressed  by  the  learned,  the  pious,  and  the  brave, 
again  exhibited  the  welcome  track  of  the  stran- 
ger's foot.  The  natural  beauties  of  the  land 
were  again  explored  and  discovered,  and  taste 
and  science  found  the  reward  of  their  enter- 
prise and  labours  in  a  country  long  depicted  as 
savage,  because  it  had  long  been  exposed  to 
desolation  and  neglect." 

In  this  book  a  party  of  travellers  visits  the 
Giant's  Causeway  and  its  scenery  is  described 
as  an  almost  unfrequented  place. 

The  new  interest  in  Ireland  of  which  she 
writes  was  very  largely  due  to  the  novels  of 
Maria  Edgeworth,  and  partly  to  those  of  Lady 
Morgan  herself. 

Her  last  novel,  The  O'Briens  and  the  O'Flaher- 
tys,  is  of  historic  value.  Its  plot  was  furnished 
by  the  stirring  events  which  took  place  when  the 
Society  of  United  Irishmen  were  fighting  for  par- 
liamentary reforms.  Lord  Edward  Fitzgerald, 
the  devoted  patriot,  is  easily  recognised  in  the 
brave  Lord  Walter  Fitzwalter,  and  the  life  of 
Thomas  Corbet  furnished  the  thrilling  adven- 


Lady  Morgan  131 

tures  of  the  hero,  Lord  Arranmore.  When 
Thomas  Moore  visited  Thomas  Corbet  at  Caen 
he  referred  to  the  account  given  of  his  escape 
from  prison  in  Lady  Morgan's  novel  as  re- 
markably accurate  in  its  details. 

The  style  of  Miss  Owenson's  earlier  books 
was  execrable  and  fully  justified  the  severe 
criticism  in  the  first  number  of  the  Quarterly 
Review.  It  gives  this  quotation  from  Ida,  or 
the  Woman  of  Athens:  "Like  Aurora,  the  ex- 
tremities of  her  delicate  limbs  were  rosed  with 
flowing  hues,  and  her  little  foot,  as  it  pressed  its 
naked  beauty  on  a  scarlet  cushion,  resembled 
that  of  a  youthful  Thetis  from  its  blushing  tints, 
or  that  of  a  fugitive  Atalanta  from  its  height. " 
The  wonder  is  that  any  serious  magazine  should 
have  wasted  two  pages  of  space  upon  such 
nonsense.  In  ridiculing  the  book  and  the 
author,  it  gives  her  some  serious  advice,  with 
the  encouragement  that  if  she  follow  it,  she 
may  become,  not  a  writer  of  novels,  but  the 
happy  mistress  of  a  family. 

Whether  Lady  Morgan  took  this  ill-meant 
advice  or  not,  her  style  improved  with  each 
book,  until  in  The  O'Briens  and  the  O'Flahertys 
it  became  simple  and  clear,  with  only  an  occa- 
sional tendency  to  high  colouring  and  bombast. 

Maria  Edgeworth  has  described  the  customs 
and  manners  of  Ireland,  and  unfolded  the 
character  of  its  people  in  a  manner  that  has 


Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 


never  been  equalled.  But  Lady  Morgan,  far 
inferior  as  an  artist,  has  given  fuller  and  more 
picturesque  descriptions  of  the  landscape  of 
the  country,  and  has  made  a  valuable  addition 
to  the  books  bearing  on  the  history  of  Ireland. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

Elizabeth  Hamilton.     Anna  Porter. 

Jane  Porter 
CLIZABETH  HAMILTON  was  also  an  Irish 

Lf  writer,  but  through  her  one  novel  she  will 
always  be  associated  with  Scotland.  In  The 
Cottagers  of  Glenburnie  she  did  for  the  Scotch 
people  what  Maria  Edgeworth  had  done  for  the 
Irish,  and  represented  for  the  first  time  in 
fiction  the  life  of  the  common  people.  It  is  a 
story  of  poor  people  of  the  serving  class.  Mrs. 
Mason,  who  had  been  an  upper  servant  in  the 
family  of  a  lord,  has  been  pensioned  and  takes 
up  her  abode  with  a  cousin  in  the  village  of 
Glenburnie.  She  was  among  the  earliest  of  our 
settlement  workers.  This  little  village  with  the 
pretty  name,  situated  in  a  beautiful  country, 
had  accumulated  about  its  homes  as  much  filth 
as  the  tenements  of  the  poorest  ward  of  a  large 
city,  and  for  the  same  reason,  that  its  inhabi- 
tants did  not  understand  the  value  of  cleanliness. 
Its  thatched  cottages,  had  it  not  been  for  their 
chimneys  and  the  smoke  issuing  from  them, 
133 


134    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

would  have  passed  for  stables  or  hog-sties,  for 
there  was  a  dunghill  in  front  of  every  door. 

Mrs.  MacClarty's  cottage,  where  Mrs.  Mason 
was  to  live,  was  like  all  the  rest.  It  was  as 
dirty  inside  as  out.  Mrs.  MacClarty  picked  up 
a  cloth  from  the  floor  beside  her  husband's 
boots,  with  which  to  wipe  her  dishes,  and  made 
her  cheese  in  a  kettle  which  had  not  been  washed 
since  the  chickens  had  eaten  their  last  meal 
from  it,  although  the  remains  of  their  feast  still 
adhered  to  the  sides.  When  Mrs.  MacClarty 
put  her  black  hands  into  the  cheese  to  stir  it, 
Mrs.  Mason  reminded  her  gently  that  she  had 
not  washed  them: 

"  'Hoot, '  returned  the  gudewife,  'my  hands 
do  weel  eneugh.  I  canna  be  fash'd  to  clean 
them  at  ilka  turn.'  " 

When  Mrs.  Mason  proposed  that  the  windows 
should  be  hung  on  hinges  and  supplied  with 
iron  hooks,  so  that  they  could  be  opened  at 
pleasure,  Mr.  MacClarty  objected  to  the  plan: 

"  'And  wha  do  you  think  wad  put  in  the 
cleek?'  returned  he.  'Is  there  ane,  think  ye, 
aboot  this  hoose,  that  would  be  at  sic  a  fash  ? ' 

"'Ilka  place  has  just  its  ain  gait,'  said  the 
gudewife,  '  and  ye  needna  think  that  ever  we  '11 
learn  yours.  And,  indeed,  to  be  plain  wi'  you, 
cusine,  I  think  you  hae  owre  mony  fykes. 
There,  didna  ye  keep  Grizzy  for  mair  than  twa 
hours,  yesterday  morning,  soopin'  and  dustin' 


Elizabeth  Hamilton  135 

your  room  in  every  corner,  an*  cleanin'  out  the 
twa  bits  of  buird,  that  are  for  naething  but  to 
set  your  foot  on  after  a'?'  ' 

It  may  be  well  to  explain  that  the  chickens 
had  been  roosting  in  this  chamber  before  Mrs. 
Mason's  arrival. 

The  story  of  Mr.  MacClarty's  death  is  pa- 
thetic. He  is  lying  ill  with  a  fever  in  the  press- 
bed  in  the  kitchen,  where  not  a  breath  of  air 
reaches  him.  The  neighbours  have  crowded  in 
to  offer  sympathy.  The  doors  are  tightly  closed, 
and  his  wife  has  piled  blankets  over  him  and 
given  him  whiskey  and  hot  water  to  drink. 
When  Mrs.  Mason,  who  knows  that  with  proper 
care  his  life  can  be  saved,  urges  that  he  be  re- 
moved to  her  room  where  he  can  have  air,  all 
the  neighbours  violently  oppose  her  advice.  But 
Peter  MacGlashon,  the  oracle  of  the  village, 
looks  at  it  more  philosophically: 

"  '  If  it 's  the  wull  o'  God  that  he  's  to  dee,  it 's 
a'  ane  whar  ye  tak  him;  ye  canna  hinder  the 
wull  o' God.'" 

But  upon  Mrs.  Mason's  insisting  that  we 
should  do  our  best  to  save  the  life  of  the  sick 
with  the  reason  God  has  given  us,  Peter  becomes 
alarmed : 

; '  That 's    no    soond     doctrine, '    exclaimed 
Peter.     'It  's  the  law  of  works."' 

Elizabeth  Hamilton  had  been  a  teacher  and 
had  written  books  on  education,  so  that  her 


136    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

description  of  the  school  which  Mrs.  Mason 
opened  in  the  village  gives  an  accurate  idea 
of  the  Scottish  schools  for  the  poorer  classes. 
Each  class  was  divided  into  landlord,  tenants, 
and  under-tenants,  one  order  being  responsible 
for  a  specific  amount  of  reading  and  writing  to 
the  order  above  it.  The  landlord  was  re- 
sponsible to  the  master  both  for  his  own  dili- 
gence and  the  diligence  of  his  vassals.  If  the 
tenants  disobeyed  the  laws  they  were  tried 
by  a  jury  of  their  mates.  The  results  of  the 
training  at  Mrs.  Mason's  school  might  well  be 
an  aim  of  teachers  to-day:  "To  have  been 
educated  at  the  school  of  Glenburnie  implied 
a  security  for  truth,  diligence  and  honesty." 

The  pupils  in  the  school  gradually  learned 
to  love  cleanliness  and  order.  The  little  flower- 
garden  in  front  gave  pleasure  to  all.  The 
villagers  declared,  "The  flowers  are  a  hantel 
bonnier  than  the  midden  and  smell  a  hantel 
sweeter,  too."  With  this  improvement  in 
taste,  the  "gude  auld  gaits"  gave  way  to  a 
better  order  of  things. 

The  Cottagers  of  Glenburnie  is  more  realistic 
in  detail  than  anything  which  had  yet  been 
written.  It  is  a  short  simple  story  told  in  sim- 
ple language.  There  is  a  slight  plot,  but  it  is 
the  village  upon  which  our  attention  is  fastened. 
One  individual  stands  out  more  strongly  than 
the  rest:  that  is  Mrs.  MacClarty  with  her  con- 


Anna  Porter  137 

stant  expression,  "It  is  well  eneugh.     I  canna 
be  fashed." 

This  little  book  was  read  in  every  Scotch 
village,  and  many  of  the  poor  people  saw  in  it 
a  picture  of  their  own  homes.  But  its  sound 
common-sense  appealed  to  them.  It  was  rea- 
sonable that  butter  without  hairs  would  sell 
for  more  than  with  them,  and  that  gardens 
without  weeds  would  produce  more  vegetables 
than  when  so  encumbered.  The  book  did  for 
the  cottagers  of  Scotland  what  Mrs.  Mason  had 
done  for  those  of  Glenburnie. 

The  lives  of  Anna  Maria  and  Jane  Porter 
resemble  in  a  few  particulars  that  of  Elizabeth 
Hamilton.  Like  her  they  belonged,  at  least 
on  the  father's  side,  to  Ireland,  and  like  her 
they  lived  in  Scotland,  and  their  names  will 
always  be  associated  with  that  country.  But 
Elizabeth  Hamilton  wrote  the  first  novel  of 
Scotland's  poor,  the  ancestor  of  The  Window 
in  Thrums  and  Beside  the  Bonnie  Brier  Bush; 
Jane  Porter  wrote  the  first  novel  of  Scotland's 
kings,  the  immediate  forerunner  of  Waver  ley, 
The  Abbot,  and  The  Monastery. 

Upon  the  death  of  Major  Porter,  who  had 
been  stationed  for  some  years  with  his  regiment 
at  Durham,  Mrs.  Porter  removed  to  Edinburgh, 
where  her  children  were  educated.  Their  quick 
lively  imaginations  found  food  for  growth  on 


138    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Scottish  soil.  At  that  time  Caledonia  was  a 
land  of  cliff  and  crag,  inhabited  by  a  quarrelsome 
people,  whom  the  English  still  regarded  with 
something  the  same  aversion  which  Dr.  Johnson 
had  so  often  expressed  to  Boswell.  But  every 
castle  had  its  story  of  brave  knights  and  fair 
ladies,  and  every  brae  had  been  the  scene  of 
renowned  deeds  of  arms.  In  every  cottage  the 
memory  of  the  past  was  kept  alive,  and  fathers 
and  mothers  related  to  their  children  stories 
of  Wallace  and  of  Bruce,  until  the  romantic 
past  became  more  real  than  the  living  present. 
Mrs.  Porter's  servants  delighted  to  relate  to 
her  eager  children  stories  of  Scotland's  glory. 
The  maids  would  sing  to  them  the  songs  of 
"Wallace  wight,"  and  the  serving-man  would 
tell  them  tales  of  Bannockburn  and  Cam- 
bus-Kenneth. 

Rarely  have  stories  fallen  on  such  fertile  soil. 
In  a  short  time,  three  of  these  children  became 
famous.  Sir  Robert  Ker  Porter,  the  brother  of 
Anna  and  Jane,  followed  closely  in  the 
footsteps  of  Scotland's  heroes,  and  became  dis- 
tinguished as  a  soldier  and  diplomat,  as  well 
as  a  famous  painter  of  battles.  He  painted  the 
enormous  canvas  of  The  Storming  of  Seringa- 
patam,  a  sensational  panorama,  one  hundred 
and  twenty  feet  in  length,  the  first  of  its  kind, 
but  in  a  style  that  has  often  been  followed  in 
recent  years.  The  idol  of  his  family,  it  would 


Anna  Porter  139 

seem  that  he  was  endowed  with  many  of  those 
qualities  which  his  sisters  gave  to  the  heroes 
of  their  romances. 

Anna  Maria  Porter,  the  youngest  of  the  group, 
was  the  first  to  appear  in  print.  At  the  age  of 
fifteen,  she  published  a  little  volume  called 
Artless  Tales.  From  this  time  until  her  death, 
at  least  every  two  years  a  new  book  from  her 
pen  was  announced.  She  wrote  a  large  number 
of  historical  romances,  which  were  widely  read 
and  translated  into  many  languages.  This  kind 
of  story,  in  the  hands  of  Sophia  Lee,  was  tame 
and  uninteresting.  Anna  Porter  increased  its 
scope  and  its  popularity.  Her  plots  are  well 
worked  out  with  many  thrilling  adventures. 
Her  imagination,  however,  had  been  quickened 
by  reading,  not  by  observation,  and  although 
her  scenes  cover  many  countries  of  Europe 
and  many  periods  of  history,  they  differ  but 
little  in  pictorial  detail,  and  her  characters  are 
lifeless.  Her  style  of  writing  is,  moreover,  so 
inflated  that  it  gives  an  air  of  unreality  to  her 
books. 

She  thus  describes  the  Hungarian  brothers: 
"They  were,  indeed,  perfect  specimens  of  the 
loveliness  of  youth  and  the  magnificence  of 
manhood. ' '  This  novel,  dealing  with  the  French 
Revolution,  was  one  of  the  most  popular  of 
all  her  stories.  It  went  through  several  editions 
both  in  England  and  on  the  continent.  Super- 


140    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

lative  expressions  seem  to  have  been  fashionable 
in  that  age  which  was  still  encumbered  by  much 
that  was  artificial  in  dress  and  manners.  Miss 
Porter  with  proper  formality  thus  writes  of 
her  heroine  as  she  was  recovering  from  a  faint- 
ing fit:  "With  a  blissful  shiver,  Ippolita  f lowly 
unclosed  her  eyes,  and  turning  them  round, 
with  such  a  look  as  we  may  imagine  blessed 
angels  cast,  when  awakening  amid  the  raptures 
of  another  world,  she  met  those  of  her  sweet 
and  gracious  uncle." 

Some  of  her  society  novels  are  witty  and  have 
a  lively  style,  which  suggests  the  truth  of  Mr. 
S.  C.  Hall's  description  of  the  sisters.  Anna, 
a  blonde,  handsome  and  gay,  he  named  L'Alle- 
gro,  in  contrast  to  Jane,  a  brunette,  equally 
handsome,  but  with  the  dignified  manners  of  the 
heroines  of  her  own  romances,  whom  he  styled 
II  Penseroso. 

Jane  Porter  took  a  more  serious  view  of  the 
responsibilities  of  authorship  than  her  sister. 
Her  first  novel,  Thaddeus  of  Warsaw,  was 
written  while  England  was  agitated  against 
France  and  excited  over  the  wrongs  of  Poland. 
It  grew  out  of  popular  feeling.  Miss  Porter  had 
become  acquainted  with  friends  of  Kosciusko, 
men  who  had  taken  part  with  him  in  his  coun- 
try's struggle  for  liberty,  and  made  him  the 
hero  of  the  story.  The  scenery  of  Poland  was 


Jane  Porter  141 

so  well  described  that  the  Poles  refused  to  be- 
lieve that  she  had  not  visited  their  country; 
and  events  were  related  in  a  manner  so  pleasing 
to  them  that  they  distinguished  the  author  by 
many  honours.  It  is  one  thing  to  write  an 
historical  novel  of  people  and  events  that  have 
long  been  buried  in  oblivion ;  but  to  write  a  story 
of  times  so  near  the  present  that  its  chief  actors 
are  still  living,  is,  indeed,  a  rash  task.  And 
for  any  history  to  meet  with  the  approval  of 
its  hero  and  his  friends  bespeaks  rare  excellence 
in  the  work. 

In  the  light  of  the  classic  standing  of  the 
historical  novel,  due  to  the  genius  of  Scott  and 
Dumas,  it  is  interesting  to  read  how  Thaddeus 
of  Warsaw  came  to  be  published.  Miss  Porter 
wrote  the  romance  merely  for  her  own  amuse- 
ment, with  no  thought  of  its  being  read  outside 
the  circle  of  her  family  and  intimate  friends. 
They  urged  her  to  publish  it.  But  for  a  long 
time  she  resisted  their  importunities  on  the 
ground  that  it  did  not  belong  to  any  known 
style  of  writing:  stories  of  real  life,  like  Tom 
Jones,  or  improbable  romances,  like  The  Mys- 
teries of  Udolpho,  were  the  only  legitimate  forms 
of  fiction.  Thaddeus  of  Warsaw  had  the  exact 
details  of  history  with  a  romance  added  to 
please  the  author's  fancy.  Thus  did  Jane 
Porter  discover  to  the  world  the  possibilities 
of  the  historical  novel. 


142    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Her  next  novel,  The  Scottish  Chiefs,  grew 
out  of  the  stories  she  had  heard  in  her  childhood. 
Besides  the  tales  of  Scotland's  struggle  for  inde- 
pendence which  she  heard  from  the  servants 
in  her  own  home,  a  venerable  old  woman  called 
Luckie  Forbes,  who  lived  not  far  from  Mrs. 
Porter's  house,  used  to  tell  her  of  the  wonderful 
deeds  of  William  Wallace.  Of  the  influence 
these  stories  had  upon  her  childish  mind,  Jane 
Porter  has  thus  written: 

"I  must  avow,  that  to  Luckie  Forbes's 
familiar,  and  even  endearing,  manner  of  nar- 
rating the  lives  of  William  Wallace  and  his 
dauntless  followers;  her  representation  of  their 
heart-sacrifices  for  the  good  of  their  country, 
filling  me  with  an  admiration  and  a  reverential 
amazement,  like  her  own ;  and  calling  forth  my 
tears  and  sobs,  when  she  told  of  the  deaths  of 
some,  and  of  the  cruel  execution  of  the  virtuous 
leader  of  them  all; — to  her  I  must  date  my 
early  and  continued  enthusiasm  in  the  character 
of  Sir  William  Wallace!  and  in  the  friends  his 
truly  hero-soul  delighted  to  honour." 

Before  writing  The  Scottish  Chiefs,  Miss  Porter 
read  everything  she  could  find  bearing  upon 
the  history  of  England  and  Scotland  during 
the  reigns  of  the  first  two  Edwards.  She  per- 
sonally visited  the  places  she  described.  She 
wrote  in  the  preface:  "I  assure  the  reader  that 
I  seldom  lead  him  to  any  spot  in  Scotland 


Jane  Porter  143 

whither  some  written  or  oral  testimony  re- 
specting my  hero  had  not  previously  conducted 
myself."  Besides  these  sources  of  information, 
Miss  Porter  was  familiar  with  the  poem  of 
Wallace  by  Blind  Harry  the  Minstrel,  the 
biographer  of  Scotland's  national  hero.  Blind 
Harry  lived  nearly  two  centuries  after  the  death 
of  Wallace,  but  he  had  access  to  books  now 
lost,  and  collected  stories  about  Scotland's 
struggle  for  independence  while  it  was  still 
prominent  in  the  public  mind.  Although  he 
tells  many  exalted  stories  of  the  numbers  whom 
Wallace  overcame  by  his  single  arm,  the  poem 
is  on  the  whole  authentic.  Sheriff  Mackay 
in  the  Dictionary  of  National  Biography  writes 
that  the  life  of  Wallace  by  Blind  Harry  "became 
the  secular  bible  of  his  countrymen,  and  echoes 
through  their  later  history. "  Miss  Porter  intro- 
duced love  scenes  to  vary  the  deeds  of  war, 
but  there  is  nothing  else  in  The  Scottish  Chiefs 
which  is  not  true  to  history,  or  to  that  more 
legitimate  source  of  romance,  the  traditions 
common  among  the  people. 

From  the  opening  chapter,  in  which  Wallace 
is  described  as  an  outlaw  because  he  had  re- 
fused to  take  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  an  Eng- 
lish king,  to  his  death  in  London  and  the  final 
crowning  of  Bruce,  there  is  not  a  dull  page. 
Especially  interesting  is  the  scene  between 
William  Wallace  and  the  Earl  of  Carrick,  after 


144    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

the  battle  of  Falkirk,  and  the  appearance  of 
Robert  Bruce,  who  overheard  this  conversation, 
fighting  by  the  side  of  Wallace.  The  truth  of 
this  incident  has  been  denied,  but  it  is  related 
by  Blind  Harry.  The  trial  of  William  Wallace 
in  the  great  hall  at  Westminster  for  treason, 
and  his  defence  that  he  had  never  acknowledged 
the  English  government,  is  most  impressive, 
and  is  a  matter  of  record. 

The  Scottish  Chiefs  is  the  first  historical  novel 
in  which  the  author  made  diligent  research  in 
order  to  give  a  truthful  representation  of  the 
times.  It  has  the  atmosphere  of  feudal  days. 
Notwithstanding  the  ridicule  cast  upon  Wallace 
as  a  lady's  hero,  he  is  drawn  in  heroic  propor- 
tions. Miss  Mitford  declared  that  she  scarcely 
knew  "  one  herds  de  roman  whom  it  is  possible 
to  admire,  except  Wallace  in  Miss  Porter's 
story."  The  work  is  written  in  the  style  of 
the  old  epics.  The  many  puerile  attempts  of 
the  last  few  years  to  write  an  historical  romance 
in  which  Washington  or  Lincoln  should  figure 
have  shown  how  difficult  is  the  task.  How 
weak  and  commonplace  have  these  great  men 
appeared  in  fiction!  It  requires  a  nature  akin 
to  the  heroic  to  draw  it.  In  1810,  when  it  was 
published,  The  Scottish  Chiefs  was  the  only 
great  historical  romance.  Four  years  later 
Waver  ley  was  published,  the  first  of  the  novels 
of  Sir  Walter  Scott.  This  was  superior  in 


Jane  Porter  145 

imagination  and  in  craftsmanship  to  Miss  Por- 
ter's novel,  but  not  in  interest.  The  Scottish 
Chiefs  has  since  been  excelled  by  many  others 
of  the  Waverley  novels,  though  not  by  all,  by 
Henry  Esmond,  and  A  Tale  of  Two  Cities,  but 
it  preceded  all  these  in  time,  and  still  holds  a 
place  as  a  classic  of  the  second  rank. 

Critics  of  to-day  smile  at  its  enthusiastic 
style,  but  Miss  Porter  speaks  with  no  more 
enthusiasm  than  did  the  poor  folk  from  whom 
she  heard  the  story.  As  long  as  enthusiastic 
youth  loves  an  unblemished  hero,  The  Scottish 
Chiefs  will  be  read.  It  is  impossible  to  analyse 
these  early  impressions  or  to  test  their  truth. 
One  can  only  remember  them  with  gratitude. 
Jane  Porter  has,  however,  taught  the  youth 
of  other  lands  to  reverence  Scotland's  popular 
hero,  so  that  the  mention  of  his  name  awakens 
a  thrill  of  pleasure,  and  the  hills  and  glades 
associated  with  his  deeds  glow  with  the  light  of 
romance. 

In  1815,  Jane  Porter  wrote  a  third  historical 
novel,  The  Pastor's  Fireside.  This  is  far  in- 
ferior to  The  Scottish  Chiefs.  It  has  the  same 
elevated  style,  and  the  mystery  which  sur- 
rounds the  hero  awakens  and  holds  the  attention. 
But  the  novel  deals  with  the  later  Stuarts,  and 
one  feels  that  the  author  herself  was  but  little 
interested  in  the  historical  events  about  which  she 
was  writing.  The  book  has  no  abiding  qualities. 

10 


146    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

In  1832  was  published  a  book  bearing  the 
title  Sir  Edward  Seaward' s  Narrative  of  His 
Shipwreck  and  Consequent  Discovery  of  certain 
Islands  in  the  Caribbean  Sea,  with  a  Detail  of 
many  extraordinary  and  highly  interesting  Events 
in  his  Life  from  the  year  1733  to  1749  as  written 
in  his  Own  Diary.  Edited  by  Jane  Porter.  In 
the  preface  Miss  Porter  explains  how  the  manu- 
script was  given  to  her  by  the  relatives  of  Sir 
Edward.  The  story  reads  like  a  second  Robin- 
son Crusoe.  It  has  all  the  minute  details  that 
give  an  air  of  verisimilitude  to  the  writings 
of  Defoe.  In  the  opening  chapter,  Edward 
Seaward  supposedly  gives  this  account  of 
himself: 

"Born  of  loyal  and  honest  parents,  whose 
means  were  just  sufficient  to  give  a  common 
education  to  their  children,  I  have  neither  to 
boast  of  pedigree  nor  of  learning;  yet  they  be- 
queathed to  me  a  better  inheritance — a  stout 
constitution,  a  peaceable  disposition,  and  a 
proper  sense  of  what  is  due  to  my  superiors 
and  equals;  for  such  an  inheritance  I  am  grateful 
to  God,  and  to  them." 

In  the  story  he  is  married  to  a  woman  of  his 
own  rank,  and  she  embarks  with  him  for  Ja- 
maica, but  they  are  shipwrecked  on  an  island 
near  Lat.  14  deg.  30  min.  N.  and  Long.  81 
deg.  W.  They  find  bags  of  money  hidden  on 
the  island,  some  negroes  come  to  them,  and  a 


Jane  Porter  147 

schooner  is  driven  to  their  haven.  Edward 
sees  in  this  a  purpose  which  afterward  is  ful- 
filled. He  says  to  his  wife:  "I  should  be  the 
most  ungrateful  of  men,  to  the  good  God  who 
has  bestowed  all  this  on  me,  if  I  did  not  feel 
that  this  money,  so  wonderfully  delivered  into 
my  hands,  was  for  some  special  purpose  of  stew- 
ardship. The  providential  arrival  of  the  poor 
castaway  negroes,  and  then  of  the  schooner,— 
all — all  working  together  to  give  us  the  means 
of  providing  every  comfort,  towards  planting 
a  colony  of  refuge  in  that  blessed  haven  of  our 
own  preservation, — seem  to  me,  in  solemn 
truth,  as  so  many  signs  from  the  Divine  Will, 
that  it  is  our  duty  to  fulfil  a  task  allotted  to  us, 
in  that  long  unknown  island." 

This  island  becomes  inhabited  by  a  happy 
people,  and  Seaward  is  knighted  by  George 
the  Second. 

Everybody  read  the  book.  A  second  edition 
was  called  for  within  the  year.  Old  naval 
officers  got  out  their  charts,  and  hunted  up 
the  probable  locality  of  the  places  mentioned. 
Nobody  at  first  doubted  its  veracity.  The 
Quarterly,  however,  decided  that  no  such  man 
had  ever  existed  and  that  the  whole  story  was 
a  fiction.  It  hunted  for  a  schooner  mentioned 
and  the  names  of  the  naval  officers.  The  latter 
had  never  served  in  his  Majesty's  navy  and  the 
former  had  not  timed  her  voyages  according  to 


148    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

the  story.  The  uniform  of  a  naval  officer 
described  in  the  narrative  was  not  worn  until 
thirteen  years  after  these  adventures  had  taken 
place,  and  no  man  by  the  name  of  Seaward  had 
been  knighted  during  this  time,  nor  was  there 
any  village  in  England  having  the  name  of  the 
village  which  he  gave  as  his  birthplace.  Sup- 
posing the  editor  had  changed  names  and  dates, 
the  Quarterly  criticism  becomes  valueless.  Al- 
though the  magazine  declared  it  a  work  of 
fiction,  it  gave  both  the  story  and  the  style 
high  praise,  and  declared  it  far  superior  to  her 
romances.  When  Miss  Porter  was  asked  about 
it,  she  declined  to  answer,  but  said  that  Scott 
had  his  great  secret  and  she  might  be  permitted 
to  have  her  little  one. 

It  is  generally  considered  now  to  have  been 
the  work  of  Jane  Porter.  No  two  books  differ 
more  in  style  than  The  Scottish  Chiefs  and 
Sir  Edward  Seaward.  But  twenty-two  years 
had  elapsed  between  them.  The  former  is 
written  in  dignified,  stately  language;  the  latter 
in  simple  homely  words,  and  both  its  invention 
and  its  style  entitle  it  to  a  place  among  English 
classics. 


CHAPTER  IX 

Amelia  Opie.     Mary  Brunton 

EVERY  novel  that  touches  upon  the  life 
of  its  generation  naturally  in  course  of 
time  becomes  historical.  These  novels  should 
be  preserved,  not  necessarily  for  their  literary 
excellence,  but  because  they  bear  the  imprint 
of  an  age.  Such  are  the  novels  of  Amelia  Opie 
and  Mary  Brunton. 

Mrs.  Opie,  then  Miss  Alderson,  left  her  quiet 
home  in  Norwich  to  visit  London  at  the  height 
of  the  furor  occasioned  by  the  French  Revolu- 
tion. The  literary  circles  in  which  she  was 
received  were  discussing  excitedly  the  rights  of 
men  and  women,  and  the  beauties  of  life  lived 
according  to  the  dictates  of  nature.  Among 
these  enthusiasts,  Miss  Alderson  met  Mary  Woll- 
stonecraft,  the  author  of  Vindication  of  the 
Rights  of  Woman,  and  esteemed  her  highly. 
Her  own  imagination  did  not,  however,  yield 
to  the  intoxication  of  a  life  of  perfect  freedom, 
a  dream  which  wrecked  the  life  of  Mary  Woll- 
stonecraft. 

149 


150    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

There  is  no  sadder  biography  than  that  of 
Mary  Wollstonecraft.  In  Paris,  she  met  Gilbert 
Imlay,  an  American,  with  whom  she  fell  in 
love.  When  he  wished  to  marry  her,  she  refused 
to  permit  him  to  make  her  his  wife,  because  she 
had  family  debts  to  pay,  and  she  was  unwilling 
to  have  him  legally  responsible  for  them.  But 
she  had  read  the  books  of  Rousseau,  and  had 
been  deeply  impressed  with  the  thought  that 
marriage  is  a  bondage,  not  needed  by  true  love. 
She  took  the  name  of  Imlay,  and  passed  for  his 
wife,  but  the  marriage  was  not  sanctioned 
either  by  the  church  or  by  law.  After  the  birth 
of  a  daughter,  Imlay  deserted  her.  At  first 
she  tried  to  commit  suicide,  and  there  is  the 
sad  picture  of  this  talented  woman  walking 
about  in  the  drenching  rain,  and  then  throwing 
herself  from  the  bridge  at  Putney.  She  was 
rescued,  and  a  little  over  a  year  later  became 
the  wife  of  William  Godwin. 

The  life-story  of  Mary  Wollstonecraft  sug- 
gested to  Amelia  Opie  the  novel  of  Adeline 
Mowbray,  or  ilie  Mother  and  Daughter,  which 
was  not  written  until  after  the  death  of  the 
original. 

It  is  a  tender  pathetic  story.  Mrs.  Mowbray, 
the  mother  of  Adeline,  believed  by  her  neigh- 
bours to  be  a  genius,  is  interested  in  new  theories 
of  education,  and,  while  writing  a  book  on  that 
subject,  occasionally  experiments  with  Adeline, 


Amelia  Opie  151 

although  she  neglects  her  for  the  most  part. 
In  spite  of  this  Adeline  grows  up  beautiful  and 
pure,  totally  ignorant  of  the  world  and  its 
wickedness.  Her  mother  often  quoted  in  her 
presence  the  book  of  a  Mr.  Glenmurray,  in 
which  he  proves  marriage  to  be  a  tyranny  and 
a  profanation  of  the  sacred  ties  of  love.  Ade- 
line is  captivated  by  the  enthusiastic  ideals 
of  the  young  author.  There  is  a  fine  contrast 
in  character  and  motive,  where  Adeline  is  enter- 
taining Mr.  Glenmurray,  the  high-minded  writer, 
and  Sir  Patrick  O' Carrol,  a  man  of  many  gal- 
lantries. Sir  Patrick  is  shocked  to  meet  at  her 
home  the  man  whose  theories  have  banished 
him  from  respectable  society.  Adeline,  inno- 
cent of  any  low  interpretation  that  may  be  put 
upon  her  words,  makes  the  frank  avowal  that, 
in  her  opinion,  marriage  is  a  shameless  tie,  and 
that  love  and  honour  are  all  that  should  bind 
men  and  women.  Sir  Patrick  heartily  agrees 
with  her  sentiments,  and  as  a  consequence 
accosts  her  with  a  freedom  repugnant  to  her, 
although  she  hardly  understands  its  import, 
while  Glenmurray  sits  by  gloomily,  resolving 
to  warn  her  in  private  that  the  opinions  she 
had  expressed  were  better  confined  in  the 
present  dark  state  of  the  public  mind  to  a  select 
and  discriminating  circle.  After  they  leave 
Adeline,  Glenmurray,  as  the  outcome  of  this 
meeting,  had  the  satisfaction  of  fighting  a  duel 


152    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

with  Sir  Patrick,  contrary  to  the  tenets  of  his 
own  book. 

But  when,  to  escape  the  advances  of  Sir 
Patrick,  Adeline  places  herself  under  the  pro- 
tection of  Glenmurray,  who  ardently  loves  her, 
he  urges  her  to  marry  him.  This  she  refuses 
to  do,  and  encourages  him  to  show  the  world 
the  truth  and  beauty  of  his  teachings.  Glen- 
murray, a  man  of  sensitive  nature,  suffers  more 
than  Adeline  from  the  indignities  she  con- 
stantly receives  when  she  frankly  says  she  is 
Mr.  Glenmurray's  companion,  not  his  wife. 
He  takes  her  from  place  to  place  to  avoid  them, 
for  he  realises  that  the  world  censures  her,  while 
it  excuses  him.  But  Adeline  is  so  happy  in  her 
love  for  him,  and  in  her  faith  in  his  teachings, 
that  she  endures  every  humiliation  with  the 
faith  of  the  early  Christian  martyrs.  When 
he  urges  her,  as  he  so  often  does,  to  marry  him, 
he  reads  in  her  eyes  only  grief  that  he  will  not 
gladly  suffer  for  what  he  believes  to  be  right, 
and  desists  rather  than  pain  her.  But  his  death 
is  hastened  by  the  harassing  thought  that  her 
whole  future  is  blighted  by  his  teachings.  As 
he  says  to  her  just  before  his  death: 

''Had  not  I,  with  the  heedless  vanity  of 
youth,  given  to  the  world  the  crude  conceptions 
of  four-and-twenty,  you  might  at  this  moment 
have  been  the  idol  of  a  respectable  society;  and 
I,  equally  respected,  have  been  the  husband 


Mary  Brunton  153 

of  your  heart;  while  happiness  would  perhaps 
have  kept  that  fatal  disease  at  bay,  of  which 
anxiety  has  facilitated  the  approach." 

It  is  a  beautiful  love  story,  but  the  hero  and 
heroine  were  of  too  fine  a  fibre  to  stand  alone 
against  the  world.  After  the  death  of  Glen- 
murray,  the  interest  flags.  The  conclusion  is 
weak,  not  at  all  worthy  of  the  beginning.  Love 
of  every  variety  has  been  the  theme  of  poets 
and  novelists,  but  there  is  no  love  story  more 
beautiful  for  its  self-sacrificing  devotion  to 
principle  and  to  each  other,  than  the  few  pages 
of  this  novel  which  tell  of  the  unsanctioned 
married,  life  of  the  high-minded  idealist  and 
his  bride. 

Mrs.  Opie  wrote  Simple  Tales  and  Tales  of 
Real  Life.  They  are  for  the  most  part  pathetic 
stories  in  which  unhappiness  in  the  family 
circle  is  caused  either  by  undue  sternness  of  a 
parent,  the  unfilial  conduct  of  a  son  or  daugh- 
ter, or  a  misunderstanding  between  husband  and 
wife.  The  feelings  of  the  characters  are  often 
minutely  described.  A  firm  faith  in  the  under- 
lying goodness  of  human  nature  is  shown 
throughout  all  these  tales,  and  all  teach  love 
and  forbearance. 

Mary  Brunton  like  Mrs.  Opie  wrote  to  improve 
the  ethical  ideals  of  her  generation .  In  the  books 
of  that  day  the  theory  was  often  advanced 


154    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

that  young  men  must  sow  their  wild  oats,  and 
that  men  were  more  pleasing  to  the  ladies  for 
a  few  vices.  Her  first  novel.  Self-Control,  was 
written  to  contradict  this  doctrine.  In  a  letter 
to  Joanna  Baillie,  Mrs.  Brunton  wrote: 

"I  merely  intended  to  show  the  power  of  the 
religious  principle  in  bestowing  self-command, 
and  to  bear  testimony  against  a  maxim  as 
immoral  as  indelicate,  that  a  reformed  rake 
makes  the  best  husband." 

Laura,  the  heroine  of  Self-Control,  ardently 
loved  a  man  of  rank  and  fashion.  When  she 
learned  of  his  amours,  her  love  turned  first  to 
grief,  then  to  disgust.  Stung  by  her  abhorrence, 
he  attempted  to  seduce  her  to  conquer  her  pride. 
The  purity  of  the  heroine  triumphs.  She  meets 
a  man  whom  she  esteems  and  afterwards 
marries.  Many  of  Laura's  adventures  border 
on  the  improbable,  but  her  emotions  are  truth- 
fully depicted. 

This  was  a  bolder  novel  than  appears  on  the 
surface.  Long  before  this  the  wicked  heroine 
had  been  banished  from  fiction.  The  leading 
lady  must  be  virtuous  to  keep  the  love  of  the 
hero.  Richardson  laid  down  that  law  of  the 
novel.  Mary  Brunton  asserted  the  same  rule 
for  the  hero,  and  maintained  that  a  gentleman, 
handsome,  noble,  accomplished,  could  not  re- 
tain the  love  of  a  pure  woman,  if  he  were  not 
virtuous. 


Mary  Brunton  155 

The  book  gave  rise  to  heated  discussions. 
Two  gentlemen  had  a  violent  dispute  over  it: 
one  said  it  ought  to  be  burnt  by  the  common 
hangman ;  the  other,  that  it  ought  to  be  written 
in  letters  of  gold.  Beyond  its  ethical  import, 
the  novel  has  no  literary  value. 

The  kind  reception  given  to  Self-Control  led 
the  author  to  begin  her  second  novel,  Discipline. 
This  was  intended  to  show  how  the  mind  must 
be  trained  by  suffering  before  it  can  hope  for 
true  enjoyment  when  self-control  is  lacking. 
Mary  Brunton  had  read  Miss  Edgeworth's 
description  of  the  Irish  people  with  pleasure; 
so  she  planned  to  set  forth  in  this  novel  the 
manners  of  the  Scottish  Highlands  and  of  the 
Orkneys,  where  she  herself  had  been  born. 
But  before  it  was  finished,  Waverley  was  pub- 
lished. There  the  Scottish  Highlands  stood 
forth  on  a  large  canvas,  distinct  and  truthful, 
and  Mrs.  Brunton  realised  at  once  how  weak 
her  own  attempts  were  compared  with  Scott's 
masterly  work.  Her  interest  in  her  book 
flagged,  although  it  was  published  in  December 
of  that  year.  Some  of  the  Highland  scenes 
are  interesting  because  accurately  described, 
and  her  account  of  a  mad-house  in  Edinburgh 
is  said  to  be  an  exact  representation  of  an 
asylum  for  the  insane  in  that  city. 

Mrs.  Brunton  died  before  her  third  novel, 
Emmeline,  was  finished.  Her  husband,  the 


156    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Reverend  Alexander  Brunton,  professor  of 
Oriental  Languages  at  Edinburgh  University, 
published  the  fragment  of  it  with  her  memoirs 
after  her  death.  The  aim  of  this  novel  was  to 
show  how  little  chance  of  happiness  there  is 
when  a  divorced  woman  marries  her  seducer. 
It  only  shows  the  inability  of  Emmeline  to 
live  down  her  past  shame  and  the  unhappiness 
which  follows  the  married  pair. 

In  the  novels  of  Mrs.  Opie  and  Mary  Brunton 
the  standard  of  conduct  is  the  same  as  to-day. 
Both  men  and  women  are  expected  to  lead 
upright  lives,  with  true  regard  for  the  happiness 
of  those  about  them.  In  Self-Control  the  hero 
refuses  to  fight  a  duel  with  the  villain  who 
has  injured  him,  and  forgives  him  with  a  true 
Christian  spirit.  To  be  sure,  there  are  still 
seductions,  and  the  world  of  fashion  is  without 
a  heart.  But  conduct  which  the  former  genera- 
tion would  have  regarded  with  a  smile  is  here 
denominated  SIN,  and  that  which  they  named 
Prudery  shines  forth  as  VIRTUE.  The  prob- 
lems of  life  which  these  novels  discuss  are  the 
same,  as  we  have  said,  which  agitate  the  world 
to-day. 


CHAPTER  X 

Jane  Austen 

IF  in  this  age  of  steam  and  electricity  you 
would  escape  from  the  noise  of  the  city, 
and  experience  for  an  hour  the  quiet  joys  of  the 
English  countryside,  at  a  time  when  a  chaise 
and  four  was  the  quickest  means  of  reaching  the 
metropolis  from  any  part  of  the  kingdom,  turn 
to  the  pages  of  Jane  Austen.  In  them  have  been 
preserved  faithful  pictures  of  the  peaceful  life 
of  the  south  of  England  exactly  as  it  existed 
a  hundred  and  more  years  ago.  The  gently  slop- 
ing downs  crossed  by  hedgerows,  the  lazy  rivers 
meandering  through  the  valleys,  the  little  vil- 
lages half  hidden  in  the  orchards  of  apple,  pear, 
peach,  and  plum,  all  suggest  the  land  of  happy 
homes.  On  the  outskirts  of  every  village  there 
are  the  two  of  three  gentlemen's  houses:  the 
substantial  mansion  of  the  squire,  with  its  park 
of  old  elms,  oaks,  and  beeches;  a  smaller  house 
suitable  for  a  gentleman  of  slender  income,  like 
Mr.  Bennet,  the  father  of  the  four  girls  of  Pride 
and  Prejudice,  or  for  an  elder  son  who  will  in 
time  take  possession  of  the  hall,  like  Charles 


158    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Musgrove  in  the  story  of  Persuasion;  and  the 
still  smaller  parsonage  standing  in  the  garden 
of  vegetables  and  flowers,  surrounded  by  a 
laurel  hedge,  where  lives  a  younger  son  or  a 
friend  of  the-^njly. 

The  gentry  that  inhabit  these  homes  carry 
on  the  plot  of  Jane  Austen's  novels.  And  what 
an  even,  almost  uneventful  life  they  lead.  Life 
with  them  is  one  long  holiday.  Dance  follows 
dance,  varied  only  by  a  dinner  at  the  mansion, 
a  picnic  party,  private  theatricals,  a  brief 
sojourn  at  Bath,  a  briefer  one  in  London,  or  a 
ride  to  Lyme,  seventeen  miles  away.  But  Cupid 
ever  hovers  near,  and  in  each  one  of  these  groups 
of  gentle  folk  we  watch  the  course  of  true  love, 
"which  never  did  run  smooth."  For  in  spite 
of  match-making  mammas  and  stern  fathers 
with  an  eye  that  the  marriage  settlements  shall 
be  sufficient  to  clothe  sentiment  with  true 
British  respectability,  the  six  novels  of  Jane 
Austen  contain  as  many  true  and  tender  love 
stories,  differing  from  one  another  not  so  much 
in  the  incidents  as  in  the  characters  of  the  lovers. 
Unlike  the  older  novelists,  who  constantly  drew 
the  attention  away  from  the  main  theme  by 
stories  of  thrilling  adventure,  Jane  Austen  holds 
closely  to  the  great  problem  of  fiction,  whether 
or  not  the  youths  and  maidens  will  be  happily 
married  at  the  conclusion  of  the  book. 

When  Darcy  first  meets  Elizabeth,  the  heroine 


Jane  Austen  159 

of  Pride  and  Prejudice,  he  shuns  her  and  her 
family  as  vulgar.  Elizabeth  is  so  prejudiced 
against  him  that  she  cannot  forget  his  insulting 
arrogance.  But  Darcy's  love  cannot  be 
stemmed.  Other  heroes  have  plunged  into 
raging  floods  to  rescue  the  fair  heroine.  Darcy 
does  more.  For  love  of  Elizabeth  he  accepts 
the  whole  Bennet  family,  including  Mrs.  Bennet, 
who  always  says  the  silly  thing,  and  Lydia,  who 
had  almost  invited  Wickham  to  elope  with  her 
and  was  indifferent  as  to  whether  or  not  he 
married  her,  until  Darcy  compelled  him  to  do  so 
— SL  bitter  humiliation  for  a  man  whose  greatest 
fault  was  overweening  pride  of  birth.  At 
last,  Elizabeth  comprehends  the  extent  of  his 
generosity,  his  superior  understanding  and 
strength  of  character,  and  Darcy  is  rewarded 
by  the  hand  of  the  sunniest  heroine  in  all  fiction. 
Who  but  Elizabeth  with  her  independent  spirit, 
quick  intelligence  and  lively  wit  could  curb  his 
family  pride!  They  marry,  and  we  know  they 
will  be  happy. 

Sense  and  Sensibility  works  out  a  problem 
for  lovers.  Like  many  romantic  girls,  Marianne 
asserts  that  a  woman  can  love  but  once.  "He 
never  loved  that  loved  not  at  first  sight"  is  also 
part  of  her  creed.  But  after  her  infatuation  for 
Willoughby  has  been  cured,  she  contentedly 
marries  Colonel  Brandon,  although  she  knows 
that  he  frequently  has  rheumatism  and  wears 


160    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

flannel  waistcoats.  Marianne  will  be  much 
happier  as  the  wife  of  a  man  of  mature  years 
who  loves  her  impulsive  nature  and  can  control 
it  than  she  would  have  been  with  the  gallant 
who  won  her  first  love. 

In  the  piquant  satire  of  Northanger  Abbey 
there  is  another  problem  suggested.  This  book 
is  distinctly  modern.  Man  is  the  pursued; 
woman  the  pursuer.  Bernard  Shaw  has  treated 
this  momentous  question  in  a  serious  manner 
in  many  of  his  plays.  Jane  Austen  regards  it 
with  a  humorous  smile.  Did  Henry  Tilney  ever 
know  why  he  married  Catherine  Morland?  Or 
was  this  daughter  of  a  country  parsonage,  with- 
out beauty,  without  accomplishments,  and 
without  riches,  aware  that  on  her  first  visit  to 
Bath  she  used  feminine  arts  that  would  have 
put  Becky  Sharp  to  shame — who,  by  the  way, 
was  a  little  girl  at  that  time — and  would  have 
made  Anne,  the  knowing  heroine  of  Man  and 
Superman,  green  with  envy?  Yet  her  arts 
consisted  simply  in  following  the  dictates  of 
her  heart.  She  fell  in  love  with  Henry  Tilney ; 
looked  for  him  whenever  she  entered  the  pump- 
room;  was  unhappy  if  he  were  absent  and  ex- 
pressed her  joy  at  his  approach; saw  in  him  the 
paragon  of  wisdom  and  looked  at  every  thing  with 
his  eyes.  From  first  ignoring  her,  he  began  to 
seek  her  society,  and  learn  the  true  excellence  of 
her  character.  And  then  Jane  Austen  explains ; 


Jane  Austen  161 

"I  must  confess  that  this  affection  originated 
in  nothing  better  than  gratitude;  or  in  other 
words,  that  a  persuasion  of  her  partiality  for 
him  had  been  the  only  cause  of  giving  her  a 
serious  thought.  It  is  a  new  circumstance  in 
romance,  I  acknowledge,  and  dreadfully  derog- 
atory of  an  heroine's  dignity,  but  if  it  is  as  new 
in  common  life,  the  credit  of  a  wild  imagination 
will  be  all  my  own. " 

But  lest  we  think  that  Miss  Austen  is  assert- 
ing a  rule  that  women  take  the  initiative  in 
this  matter  of  love  and  marriage,  it  is  well  to 
remember  that  Darcy  first  loved  Elizabeth 
Bennet,  and  forced  her  to  acknowledge  his 
worth,  and  that  Colonel  Brandon  married  a 
young  lady  who  had  formerly  supposed  him  at 
the  advanced  age  of  thirty-five  to  be  occupied 
with  thoughts  of  death  rather  than  of  love. 

And  Mr.  Knightley  is  another  hero  who  fell 
in  love  and  waited  patiently  for  its  return. 
Emma  is  like  Marianne  in  one  respect,  she 
needed  guidance.  Almost  from  childhood  the 
mistress  of  her  father's  house  and  the  first 
lady  in  the  society  of  Highbury,  she  was  threat- 
ened by  two  evils,  "the  power  of  having  too 
much  her  own  way,  and  a  disposition  to  think 
a  little  too  well  of  herself."  Mr.  Knightley, 
the  elder  brother  of  her  elder  sister's  husband, 
is  the  only  person  that  sees  that  she  is  not  al- 
ways wise  and  that  she  is  sometimes  selfish.  He 


162    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

is  the  only  one  that  chides  her.  Emma  is  inter- 
ested in  promoting  the  welfare  of  all  about  her, 
but  she  lacks  that  most  feminine  quality  of 
insight,  so  that  her  well-meant  help,  as  in  the 
case  of  her  prote"ge"e,  poor  Harriet  Smith,  is 
sometimes  productive  of  evil.  And  yet  Emma 
is  brave  and  self-forgetful.  Not  until  she  has 
schooled  herself  to  think  of  Mr.  Knightley  as 
married  to  Harriet,  is  she  aware  how  much  he  is 
a  part  of  her  own  life.  But  this  is  only  another 
instance  of  her  blindness.  When  she  learns 
that  he  has  loved  her  with  all  her  faults  ever 
since  she  was  thirteen,  she  is  very  happy.  There 
is  no  tumultuous  passion  in  this  union,  but  we 
are  assured  of  a  love  that  will  abide  through  the 
years. 

In  Mansfield  Park  and  in  Persuasion,  there  is 
another  variety  of  the  old  story.  Fanny  Price 
and  Anne  Elliot,  the  one  the  daughter  of  a  poor 
lieutenant  of  marines,  whose  family  is  the  most 
ill-bred  in  all  Miss  Austen's  books,  the  other 
the  neglected  daughter  of  Sir  Walter  Elliot, 
Baronet,  have  more  in  common  than  any  other 
of  her  heroines.  Although  these  stories  are 
different,  yet  in  each  it  is  the  devotion  of  the 
heroine  that  guides  the  course  of  love  through 
many  obstacles  into  a  quiet  haven.  Who  that 
reads  their  story  will  say  that  Miss  Austen's 
maidens  are  without  passion?  They  do  not 
analyse  their  feelings,  nor  do  they  pour  them 


Jane  Austen  163 

forth  in  wild  soliloquy.  But  the  heart  of  each 
is  clearly  revealed  through  little  acts  and 
expressions.  Fanny  Price,  cherishing  a  love 
for  Edmund  Bertram,  who  was  kind  to  her 
when  she  was  neglected  by  everybody  else,  re- 
fuses to  marry  the  rich,  handsome,  and  brilliant 
Mr.  Crawford,  although  she  herself  is  penniless. 
We  feel  her  misery  as  she  realises  that  she  is 
nothing  but  a  friend  to  Edmund  and  rejoice 
with  her  when  her  love  awakens  a  response. 
Anne  Elliot,  the  gentlest  of  all  her  heroines, 
who  in  obedience  to  her  father  has  broken  her 
engagement  to  Captain  Wentworth  eight  years 
before,  when  she  is  again  thrown  into  his  com- 
pany, observes  his  every  expression,  and  grows 
sad  and  weak  in  health  at  his  studied  neglect. 
Other  heroines  have  said  more,  but  none  have 
felt  more  than  Miss  Austen's.  Anne  Elliot  her- 
self has  spoken  for  them: 

"All  the  privilege  I  claim  for  my  own  sex 
(it  is  not  a  very  enviable  one)  is  that  of  loving 
longest,  when  existence,  or  when  hope,  is  gone." 

But  Jane  Austen,  like  Shakespeare,  is  a  dram- 
atist. So,  lest  this  be  taken  for  Miss  Austen's 
opinion,  Captain  Wentworth  has  the  last  word 
here  when  he  writes  to  Anne,  ''Dare  not  say 
that  man  forgets  sooner  than  woman,  that  his 
love  has  an  earlier  death.  Unjust  I  have  been, 
weak  and  resentful  I  have  been,  but  never 
inconstant." 


164    Woman* s  Work  in  Fiction 

And  so,  at  the  close  of  these  novels,  two  more 
happy  homes  are  added  to  those  of  rural  England. 

Are  there  many  heroes  and  heroines  for  whom 
we  dare  predict  a  happy  married  life?  Would 
Mr.  B.  and  Pamela  have  written  such  long  let- 
ters to  each  other  about  the  training  of  their 
children  if  conversation  had  not  been  a  bore? 
Evelina  must  have  been  disappointed  to  dis- 
cover that  Lord  Orville  lived  on  roast  beef, 
plum-pudding,  and  port  wine  instead  of  music 
and  poetry.  Of  all  Scott's  heroes  and  heroines 
none  had  sacrificed  more  for  each  other  than 
Ivanhoe  and  Rowena;  he  gave  up  Rotherwood, 
and,  as  a  disinherited  son,  sought  forgetfulness 
of  her  charms  in  distant  Palestine;  she  put 
aside  all  hopes  of  becoming  a  Saxon  queen,  and 
was  true  to  the  gallant  son  of  Cedric.  Yet  we 
have  Thackeray  for  authority  that  they  were 
not  only  unhappy,  but  often  quarrelled  after 
Scott  left  them  at  the  altar.  And  none  of 
Thackeray's  marriages  turned  out  well,  although 
Becky  Sharp  made  Rodney  Crawley  very  happy 
until  he  discovered  her  wiles.  Dickens  was 
perhaps  more  fortunate,  but  David  was  led 
away  by  the  cunning  ways  of  Dora  before  he 
discovered  a  companion  and  helpmate  in  Agnes, 
a  heroine  worthy  to  be  placed  beside  Elizabeth 
and  Jane  Bennet.  George  Eliot's  books  and 
those  of  later  novelists  are  rather  a  warning 
than  an  incentive  to  matrimony.  Have  all 


Jane  Austen  165 

our  sighs  and  tears  over  the  mishaps  of  ill- 
starred  lovers  been  in  vain,  and  is  it  true  that 
when  the  curtain  falls  at  the  wedding  it  is  only 
to  shut  from  view  a  scene  of  domestic  infelicity? 
Not  so  with  Jane  Austen.  She  is  the  queen 
of  match-makers.  The  marriages  brought  about 
by  her  guidance  give  a  belief  in  the  permanency 
of  English  home  life,  quite  as  necessary  for 
the  welfare  of  the  kingdom  as  the  stability  of 
Magna  Charta.  Her  heroes  have  qualities  that 
wear  well,  and  her  heroines  might  have  inspired 
Wordsworth's  lines: 

A  creature  not  too  bright  or  good 

For  human  nature's  daily  food, 

For  transient  sorrows,  simple  wiles, 

Praise,  blame,  love,  kisses,  tears  and  smiles. 

Besides  the  lovers,  many  diverting  people 
lived  in  these  homes  of  the  gentry,  quite  as 
amusing  as  any  of  the  peasants  who  were 
brought  upon  the  stage  by  the  older  dramatists 
for  our  entertainment;  perhaps  more  amusing, 
because  of  their  self-sufficiency.  These  people 
seldom  do  anything  that  is  peculiar,  nor  are 
they  the  objects  of  practical  jokes,  as  were  so 
many  men  and  women  in  the  earlier  books;  but 
they  talk  freely  both  at  home  and  abroad  about 
whatever  is  of  interest  to  them.  They  seldom 
use  stereotyped  words  or  phrases,  yet  their 
conversation  is  a  crystal  from  which  the  whole 
mental  horizon  of  the  speaker  shines  forth. 


1 66    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

When  Mrs.  Bennet  learns  that  Netherfield  Park 
has  been  let  to  a  single  gentleman  of  fortune, 
her  first  exclamation  comes  from  the  heart — 
"What  a  fine  thing  for  our  girls!"  After  Mr. 
Collins,  upon  whom  Mr.  Bennet's  estate  is  en- 
tailed, has  resolved  to  make  all  possible  amends 
to  his  daughters  by  marrying  one  of  them,  and 
is  making  his  famous  proposal  to  Elizabeth,  he 
says  with  solemn  composure:  "But,  before  I 
am  run  away  with  by  my  feelings  on  this  subject, 
perhaps  it  would  be  advisable  for  me  to  state 
my  reasons  for  marrying — and,  moreover,  for 
coming  into  Hertfordshire  with  the  design  of 
selecting  a  wife,  as  I  certainly  did."  No  won- 
der Elizabeth  laughed  at  such  a  lover.  Mr. 
Collins  is  the  same  type  of  man  as  Mr.  Smith, 
whom  Evelina  meets  at  Snow  Hill,  but  infinitely 
more  ridiculous  because  he  is  an  educated  man 
of  some  attainments. 

Then  there  is  Mr.  Woodhouse,  the  father  of 
Emma,  with  his  constant  solicitude  for  every- 
body's health  and  his  fears  that  they  may  have 
indigestion.  When  his  daughter  and  her  family 
arrive  from  London,  all  well  and  hearty,  he 
says  by  way  of  hospitality:  "You  and  I  will 
have  a  nice  basin  of  gruel  together.  My  dear 
Emma,  suppose  we  all  have  a  basin  of  gruel." 
His  friend  Mrs.  Bates  is  always  voluble.  She 
is  describing  Mr.  Dixon's  country  seat  in  Ireland 
to  Emma:  "Jane  has  heard  a  great  deal  of  its 


Jane  Austen  167 

beauty — from  Mr.  Dixon,  I  mean — I  do  not 
know  that  she  ever  heard  about  it  from  anybody 
else — but  it  was  very  natural,  you  know,  that 
he  should  like  to  speak  of  his  own  place  while 
he  was  paying  his  addresses — and  as  Jane  used 
to  be  very  often  walking  out  with  them — for 
Colonel  and  Mrs.  Campbell  were  very  particular 
about  their  daughter's  not  walking  out  often 
with  only  Mr.  Dixon,  for  which  I  do  not  at  all 
blame  them;  of  course  she  heard  everything  he 
might  be  telling  Miss  Campbell  about  his  own 
home  in  Ireland."  One  respects  the  mental 
power  of  a  woman  who  could  remember  the 
main  thread  of  her  discourse  amid  so  many 
digressions. 

How  characteristic  is  Sir  Walter  Elliot's  reply 
to  the  gentleman  who  is  trying  to  bring  a  neigh- 
bour's name  to  his  mind.  "Wentworth?  Oh, 
ay!  Mr.  Wentworth,  the  curate  of  Monkford. 
You  misled  me  by  the  term  Gentleman.  I 
thought  you  were  speaking  of  some  man  of 
property. "  And  not  the  least  amusing  of  these 
people  is  Mr.  Elton's  bride,  a  pert  sort  of  wo- 
man who  for  some  reason  patronises  every- 
body into  whose  company  she  is  thrown.  After 
meeting  Mr.  Knightley,  by  far  the  most  conse- 
quential person  about  Highbury,  she  expresses 
her  approval  of  him  to  Emma:  "Knightley  is 
quite  the  gentleman!  I  like  him  very  much! 
Decidedly,  I  think,  a  very  gentlemanlike  man." 


i68    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

And  Emma  wonders  if  Mr.  Knightley  has  been 
able  to  pronounce  this  self-important  new- 
comer as  quite  the  lady.  Pick  out  almost  any 
speech  at  random,  and  anyone  who  is  at  all 
familiar  with  Miss  Austen  will  easily  recognise 
the  speaker. 

This  ability  to  describe  people  by  such  deli- 
cate touches  has  been  highly  praised  by  Ma- 
caulay  in  the  essay  on  Madame  D'Arblay  before 
quoted.  He  thus  compares  Jane  Austen  with 
Shakespeare : 

"Admirable  as  he  [Shakespeare]  was  in  all 
parts  of  his  art,  we  must  admire  him  for  this, 
that,  while  he  has  left  us  a  greater  number  of 
striking  portraits  than  all  other  dramatists 
put  together,  he  has  scarcely  left  us  a  single 
caricature.  Shakespeare  has  had  neither  equal 
nor  second.  But  among  the  writers  who,  in 
the  point  which  we  have  mentioned,  have  ap- 
proached nearest  to  the  manner  of  the  great 
master,  we  have  no  hesitation  in  placing  Jane 
Austen,  a  woman  of  whom  England  is  justly 
proud.  She  has  given  us  a  multitude  of  char- 
acters, all,  in  a  certain  sense,  commonplace,  all 
such  as  we  meet  every  day.  Yet  they  are  all 
as  perfectly  discriminated  from  each  other 
as  if  they  were  the  most  eccentric  of  human 
beings.  There  are,  for  instance,  four  clergy- 
men, none  of  whom  we  should  be  surprised 
to  find  in  any  parsonage  in  the  kingdom,  Mr. 


Jane  Austen  169 

Edward  Ferrars,  Mr.  Henry  Tilney,  Mr.  Ed- 
mund Bertram,  and  Mr.  Elton.  They  are  all 
specimens  of  the  upper  part  of  the  middle 
class.  They  have  all  been  liberally  educated. 
They  all  lie  under  the  restraints  of  the  same 
sacred  profession.  They  are  all  young.  They 
are  all  in  love.  Not  one  of  them  has  any  hobby- 
horse, to  use  the  phrase  of  Sterne.  Not  one 
has  a  ruling  passion,  such  as  we  read  of  in  Pope. 
Who  would  not  have  expected  them  to  be  in- 
sipid likenesses  of  each  other?  No  such  thing. 
Harpagon  is  not  more  unlike  to  Jourdain, 
Joseph  Surface  is  not  more  unlike  to  Sir  Lucius 
O 'Trigger,  than  every  one  of  Miss  Austen's 
young  divines  to  his  reverend  brethren.  And 
almost  all  this  is  done  by  touches  so  delicate 
that  they  elude  analysis,  that  they  defy  the 
powers  of  description,  and  that  we  know  them 
to  exist  only  by  the  general  effect  to  which  they 
have  contributed." 

Like  Shakespeare  Jane  Austen  knew  the 
inner  nature  by  intuition,  and  had  learned  its 
outward  expression  by  observation.  Character 
not  only  affects  the  speech  of  each  one  of  her 
men  and  women,  but  determines  their  destiny 
and  shapes  the  plot  of  the  story.  The  class  she 
has  chosen  to  represent  is  the  least  under  the 
sway  of  circumstances  of  any  in  England. 
With  money  for  all  needs,  and  leisure  for  enjoy- 
ment, free  from  obligations  which  pertain  to 


170    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

higher  rank,  character  here  develops  freely  and 
naturally.  Not  one  of  the  matchmaking  men 
or  women,  not  even  the  intelligent  Emma,  suc- 
ceeds in  changing  the  life  of  those  whom  they 
attempt  to  influence.  Character  is  stronger 
than  any  outside  agency.  In  this  respect,  Jane 
Austen  is  decidedly  at  variance  with  Thomas 
Hardy  or  Tolstoi,  but  she  is  at  one  with 
Shakespeare. 

In  the  opening  paragraph  of  each  book, 
character  begins  to  assert  itself.  If  Darcy 
had  been  without  PRIDE,  and  Elizabeth  had 
been  without  PREJUDICE;  if  Marianne  had  had 
her  sensibilities  under  control ;  if  Emma  had  not 
been  blind;  if  Captain  Wentworth  had  not 
been  unjust  and  resentful — there  would  have 
been  no  story  to  tell,  the  course  of  true  love 
would  have  run  so  smooth.  But  all  of  them 
are  loving  and  faithful,  and  these  qualities  in 
the  end  conquer,  and  bring  the  stories  to  a 
happy  conclusion. 

Edmund  Gosse  thus  writes  of  her  delineation 
of  character: 

"Like  Balzac,  like  Tourgenieff  at  his  best, 
Jane  Austen  gives  the  reader  an  impression  of 
knowing  everything  there  was  to  know  about 
her  creations,  of  being  incapable  of  error  as  to 
their  acts,  thoughts,  or  emotions.  She  presents 
an  absolute  illusion  of  reality;  she  exhibits  an 
art  so  consummate  that  we  mistake  it  for 


Jane  Austen  171 

nature.  She  never  mixes  her  own  temperament 
with  those  of  her  characters,  she  is  never  swayed 
by  them,  she  never  loses  for  a  moment  her 
perfect,  serene  control  of  them.  Among  the 
creators  of  the  world,  Jane  Austen  takes  a  place 
that  is  with  the  highest  and  that  is  purely  her 
own. " 

This  seeming  control  of  her  characters  is  due 
largely  to  the  fact  that  whatever  happens  to 
them  is  just  what  might  have  been  expected. 
This  is  particularly  true  of  the  bad  people  she 
has  created.  Innocence  led  astray  has  been  a 
popular  means  of  exciting  interest  ever  since 
Richardson  told  the  sad  story  of  Clarissa  Har- 
lowe.  But  there  is  no  such  incident  in  Jane 
Austen's  books.  Lydia,  who  has  n't  a  thought 
for  anybody  nor  anything  but  a  red-coat,  and 
Wickham,  who  elopes  with  her  without  any 
intention  of  matrimony,  are  properly  punished, 
by  being  married  to  each  other,  and  the  future 
unhappiness  which  must  be  their  lot  is  due  to 
their  own  natures.  Willoughby  had  seduced 
one  girl,  trifled  with  the  affections  of  another, 
and  married  an  heiress,  but  he  finds  only  misery, 
and  sadly  says :  ' '  I  must  rub  through  the  world 
as  well  as  I  can."  Henry  Crawford,  and  his 
sister,  with  so  much  that  is  good  in  their  natures, 
yet  with  a  lack  of  moral  fibre,  are  both  unhappy. 
Each  has  lost  the  one  they  respected  and  loved 
and  might  have  married.  With  what  wit  she 


172    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

leaves  William  Elliot,  the  all-agreeable  man, 
the  heir  of  Sir  Walter,  who,  that  he  may  keep 
the  latter  single,  has  enticed  the  scheming  Mrs. 
Clay  from  his  home: 

"And  it  is  now  a  doubtful  point  whether  his 
cunning  or  hers  may  finally  carry  the  day; 
whether,  after  preventing  her  from  being  the 
wife  of  Sir  Walter,  he  may  not  be  wheedled 
and  caressed  at  last  into  making  her  the  wife 
of  Sir  William." 

And  so  punishment  is  meted  out  with  that 
nicety  of  judgment  which  distinguishes  every 
detail  of  her  novels. 

But  Jane  Austen  has  little  interest  in  immor- 
ality. "Let  other  pens  dwell  on  guilt  and 
misery;  I  quit  such  odious  subjects  as  soon  as 
I  can,"  she  says  in  Mansfield  Park.  And  her 
readers  have  observed  that  deeds  of  evil  take 
place  off  the  stage,  while  she  records  only  what 
is  reported  of  them  in  the  drawing-room. 

She  dwells  as  little  on  misery  as  on  guilt.  She 
shows  in  her  letters  charitable  regard  for  the 
poor  people  of  Steventon  and  Chawton.  She 
describes  minutely  the  unkempt  house  of 
Lieutenant  Price  at  Portsmouth  with  its  in- 
cessant noise  of  heavy  steps,  banging  doors, 
and  untrained  servants,  where  every  voice  was 
loud  excepting  Mrs.  Price's,  which  resembled 
"the  soft  monotony  of  Lady  Bertram's,  only 
worn  into  fretfulness. "  Miss  Austen's  pen  was 


Jane  Austen  173 

able  to  portray  scenes  of  squalor  and  vice; 
she  chose  to  turn  from  them.  Perhaps  she  felt 
instinctively  that  true  aesthetic  pleasure  can- 
not be  produced  by  dwelling  on  a  scene  in  a 
book  which  would  be  repulsive  to  the  eye. 
Miss  Austen  wrote  before  there  was  much 
serious  interest  in  the  lives  of  the  poor.  Their 
only  function  in  literature  had  been  to  provoke 
laughter.  The  sensitive  daughter  of  the  rector 
of  Steventon  may  have  felt,  as  others  have, 
that  there  was  no  occasion  to  laugh  at  the 
blunders  and  ill-manners  of  peasants,  which 
were  proper  and  natural  to  their  condition  of 
life.  She  did  not  need  these  people  to  entertain 
us.  There  were  quite  as  funny  people  in  the 
hall  as  in  the  cottage,  funnier,  even,  because 
their  humorous  sayings  spring  from  a  humorous 
twist  in  their  natures,  not  from  ignorance. 

Sir  Walter  Scott,  after  reading  Pride  and 
Prejudice  for  the  third  time,  said: 

"That  young  lady  had  a  talent  for  describing 
the  involvements  and  feelings  and  characters 
of  ordinary  life,  which  is  to  me  the  most  won- 
derful I  ever  met  with.  The  Big  Bow-wow 
strain  I  can  do  myself,  like  any  now  going;  but 
the  exquisite  touch,  which  renders  ordinary 
commonplace  things  and  characters  interesting 
from  the  truth  of  the  description  and  the  senti- 
ment, is  denied  to  me." 

Sir  Walter  Scott  proved  the  truth  of  the  above 


174    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

statement  in  St.  Ronan's  Well,  one  of  the  least 
successful  of  his  novels,  which  was  written  in 
imitation  of  Jane  Austen. 

Because  Jane  Austen  confined  her  work  so 
closely  to  ordinary  middle-class  people,  she  has 
been  called  narrow.  But  if  we  judge  men  and 
women  not  by  dress  and  manners,  but  by  what 
they  are,  these  people  furnish  as  broad  a  view 
of  humanity  as  could  be  obtained  by  travelling 
up  and  down  the  world.  A  trained  botanist 
will  gather  an  herbarium  from  a  country  lane 
that  will  give  a  more  extended  knowledge  of 
botany  than  a  less  skilful  one  could  get  by 
travelling  through  the  woods  and  fields  of  a 
continent.  Very  few  novelists  have  portrayed 
greater  varieties  of  human  nature  than  Miss 
Austen. 

Jane  Austen's  style  has  been  praised  by  all 
critics.  George  William  Curtis  wrote  of  her 
art: 

"She  writes  wholly  as  an  artist,  while  George 
Eliot  advocates  views,  and  Miss  Bronte's  fiery- 
page  is  often  a  personal  protest.  In  Miss  Austen, 
on  the  other  hand,  there  is  in  kind,  but  infinitely 
less  in  degree,  the  same  clear  atmosphere  of 
pure  art  which  we  perceive  in  Shakespeare  and 
Goethe." 

While  Miss  Austen  has  been  so  often  likened 
to  Shakespeare,  she  is  in  no  sense  a  roman- 
tic writer.  She  belongs  purely  to  the  classic 


Jane  Austen  175 

school.  She  has  the  restraint,  the  perfect  poise 
of  the  Greeks.  She  recognises  everywhere  the 
need  of  law.  She  accepts  society  as  it  exists 
under  the  restraints  of  law  and  religion.  She 
no  more  questioned  the  English  prayer  book 
and  the  English  constitution  than  Homer  ques- 
tioned the  existence  of  the  gods  and  the  supreme 
power  of  kings.  This  feeling  for  law  shaped 
her  art.  Her  plots  are  perfectly  symmetrical. 
There  is  no  redundancy  in  expression.  There 
is  none  of  that  wild  luxuriance  in  fancy  or  ex- 
pression so  common  in  romanticism.  Each 
word  used  is  needed  in  the  sentence,  and  is  in 
its  proper  place.  The  strength  of  romanticism 
lies  in  its  impetuosity ;  the  strength  of  classicism 
lies  in  its  self-control.  This  is  the  strength  of 
Jane  Austen. 

Emotion  in  her  books  is  so  restrained  that 
the  superficial  reader  doubts  its  existence. 
Yet  her  characters  feel  deeply  and  are  sensitive 
to  the  acts  and  words  of  those  about  them. 
Although  their  feelings  are  under  control,  they 
are  none  the  less  real.  The  reader  watches,  but 
is  not  asked  to  participate  in  their  griefs. 

As  she  never  moves  to  tears,  neither  does  she 
provoke  laughter,  but  she  lightens  every  page 
with  a  quiet  glow  of  humour.  Humour  was  as 
natural  to  her  as  to  Elizabeth  Bennet,  whose 
sayings  give  the  sparkle  to  Pride  and  Prejudice. 
Much  of  the  humour  in  her  letters  consists  of  an 


1 76    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

unexpected  turn  to  a  sentence  or  an  incon- 
gruous combination  of  words.  She  writes  of 
meeting  "Dr.  Hall  in  such  very  deep  mourning 
that  either  his  mother,  his  wife  or  himself  must 
be  dead."  She  announces  the  marriage  of  a 
gentleman  to  a  widow  by  the  laconic  message, 
"Dr.  Gardiner  was  married  yesterday  to  Mrs. 
Percy  and  her  three  daughters.1'  And  again 
she  says  that  a  certain  Mrs.  Blount  appeared 
the  same  as  in  September,  "with  the  same  broad 
face,  diamond  bandeau,  white  shoes,  pink 
husband,  and  fat  neck."  She  sees  through  the 
affectations  of  society  and  observes  the  pleasure 
afforded  by  the  small  misfortunes  of  another  as 
plainly  as  did  Thackeray  later.  The  wife  of  a 
certain  gentleman  is  discovered  "to  be  every- 
thing the  neighbourhood  could  wish,  silly  and 
cross  as  well  as  extravagant."  She  finds  con- 
tinual source  of  enjoyment  in  people's  foibles, 
and  thinks  that  her  own  misfortunes  ought  to 
furnish  jokes  to  her  acquaintances,  or  she  will 
die  in  their  debt  for  entertainment. 

In  a  less  refined  degree,  this  was  the  view  of 
life  of  Miss  Burney,  her  favourite  author.  Miss 
Austen  was  but  three  years  old  when  Evelina 
made  her  de*but  at  Ranelagh,  and  not  over 
seven  when  Cecilia  visited  her  three  guardians 
in  London:  Camilla  was  published  in  the  year 
that  it  is  thought  that  Miss  Austen  began  Pride 
and  Prejiidice.  During  these  years,  Miss  Bur- 


Jane  Austen  177 

ney's  fame  was  undimmed.  Consider  yourself 
for  a  moment  in  a  circulating  library,  in  the 
year  1797  or  1798,  suppose  you  are  fond  of 
novel  reading,  and  have  moreover  the  refined 
tastes  of  Miss  Austen;  you  will  find  there  no 
novelist  who  can  hold  a  rival  place  to  Miss 
Burney.  Miss  Austen  refers  to  her  both  in  her 
novels  and  letters.  In  only  one  passage  in  her 
novels  has  she  interrupted  her  story  to  express 
a  general  opinion ;  that  is  in  Northanger  Abbey, 
where  she  praises  the  art  of  the  novelist,  and 
refers  particularly  to  Cecilia,  Camilla,  and 
Belinda.  In  the  same  novel  John  Thorpe's  lack 
of  taste  is  emphasised  by  his  calling  Camilla 
a  stupid  book  of  unnatural  stuff,  which  he  could 
not  get  through.  She  evidently  discussed  Miss 
Burney's  novels  with  the  people  she  met;  a 
certain  young  man  just  entered  at  Oxford  has 
heard  that  Evelina  was  written  by  Dr.  Johnson, 
and  she  finds  two  traits  in  a  certain  Miss  Fletcher 
very  pleasing:  "  She  admires  Camilla,  and  drinks 
no  cream  in  her  tea. "  foitf  Miss  ftnste.n  was  no^ 
blind  disciple  of  Miss  Burney.  All  the  odd 
characters  which  Miss  Burney  culled  from  the 
lower  ranks  of  society  were  swept  away ,  by 
Miss  Austen.  Everything  approaching  tragedy 
or  the  improbable  is  avoided,  but  what  is  left 
is  amplified  and  refined  until  there  is  no  more 
trace  of  Miss  Burney  than  there  is  of  Perugino 
in  the  paintings  of  Raphael. 


178    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Artists  in  other  lines  have  striven  in  their 
work  for  a  unified  whole.  Most  novelists  have 
been  more  intent  on  pointing  a  moral  or  pro- 
ducing a  sensation  than  on  the  technique  of 
their  writing.  Their  works  as  a  whole  lack 
proportion.  They  obtrude  unnecessarily  in  one 
part  and  are  weak  in  another.  Miss  Austen 
wrote  because  the  characters  in  her  brain  de- 
manded expression.  Who  could  remain  silent 
with  Elizabeth  Bennet  urging  her  to  utterance? 
She  wrote  with  the  greatest  care  because  she 
could  do  nothing  slovenly.  Whatever  place 
may  be  assigned  to  her  as  the  years  go  by,  her 
novels  surpass  all  others  written  in  English  in 
their  perfect  art. 

Miss  Austen's  genius  was  but  slowly  recog- 
nised. Her  first  books  were  published  in  1811, 
only  three  years  before  Waverley,  and  her  last 
novels  were  published  after  it.  Who  will  lin- 
ger over  the  teacups  while  knights  in  armour 
are  riding  the  streets  without?  It  is  not  until 
the  cavalcade  has  passed  that  home  seems  again 
a  quiet,  refreshing  spot.  So  the  public,  tired 
of  the  brilliant  scenes  and  conflicting  passions 
of  other  novels,  has  in  the  last  few  years  turned 
back  to  the  simple,  wholesome  stories  of  Jane 
Austen. 


CHAPTER  XI 

Miss  Ferrier.      Miss  Mitford. 
Anna  Maria  Hall 

WALTER  SCOTT,  the  most  chivalrous  of 
all  writers,  brought  to  an  end  woman's 
supremacy  in  the  novel,  in  1814.  At  this  time 
prose  fiction  was  far  different  from  what  it  was 
in  1772,  when  Tobias  Smollet  died,  and  much 
of  this  difference  was  due  to  women.  Professor 
Masson,  in  his  lectures  on  the  novel,  gives  the 
names  of  twenty  novelists  who  wrote  between 
1789-1814  who  are  remembered  in  the  history 
of  English  literature.  "With  the  exception  of 
Godwin,"  he  writes,  "I  do  not  know  that  any 
of  the  male  novelists  I  have  mentioned  could 
be  put  in  comparison,  in  respect  of  genuine 
merit,  with  such  novelists  of  the  other  sex  as 
Mrs.  Radcliffe,  Miss  Edgeworth,  and  Miss  Aus- 
ten. "  It  is  equally  worthy  of  note  that,  of  the 
twenty  names  given,  fourteen  are  women. 

Although  during  these  years  women  had  de- 
veloped the  historical  novel,  and  had  brought  the 
novel  of  mystery  to  a  high  degree  of  perfection, 


180    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

they  left  the  most  enduring  stamp  on  literature 
as  realists,  as  painters  of  everyday  life  and  com- 
monplace people.  Francis  Jeffrey  wrote: 

"It  required  almost  the  same  courage  to  get 
rid  of  the  jargon  of  fashionable  life  and  the 
swarms  of  peers,  foundlings,  and  seducers,  that 
infested  our  modern  fables  as  it  did  in  those 
days  to  sweep  away  the  mythological  persons  of 
antiquity,  and  to  introduce  characters  who 
spoke  and  acted  like  those  who  were  to  peruse 
their  adventures." 

Women  awakened  interest  in  the  humdrum 
lives  of  their  neighbours  next  door,  and  this 
without  any  exaggeration,  simply  by  minute 
attention  to  little  things,  and  quick  sympathy 
in  the  joys  and  sorrows  of  others.  They  de- 
scribed manners  and  customs;  their  view  of 
life  was  largely  objective.  It  is  a  noteworthy 
fact  that  while  Scott  was  casting  over  all  Europe 
the  light  of  romanticism,  the  women  writers  of 
the  time,  with  but  one  or  two  exceptions,  were 
viewing  life  with  the  clear  vision  of  Miss  Edge- 
worth  and  Miss  Austen,  as  if  the  world  obtruded 
too  glaringly  upon  their  eyes  to  be  lost  sight 
of  in  happy  day-dreams. 

Susan  Edmonstone  Ferrier  is  better  known 
to-day  as  the  friend  of  Scott,  and  an  occasional 
visitor  at  Abbotsford,  than  as  a  successful 
novelist.  She  was  born  at  Edinburgh  in  1782, 


Miss  Ferrier  181 

where  her  father,  James  Ferrier,  was  Writer  to  the 
Signet,  and  at  one  time  Clerk  of  Session,  Scott 
being  one  of  his  colleagues.  That  great  genius 
was  one  of  the  earliest  to  appreciate  the  excel- 
lence of  her  descriptions  of  Scottish  life  given  in 
her  first  book,  entitled  Marriage,  published 
anonymously  in  1818.  In  the  conclusion  of  the 
Tales  of  my  Landlord  he  paid  the  unknown 
writer  this  graceful  tribute: 

"There  remains  behind  not  only  a  large  har- 
vest, but  labourers  capable  of  gathering  it  in; 
more  than  one  writer  has  of  late  displayed 
talents  of  this  description,  and  if  the  present 
author,  himself  a  phantom,  may  be  permitted  to 
distinguish  a  brother,  or  perhaps  a  sister,  shadow, 
he  would  mention  in  particular  the  author  of  the 
very  lively  work  entitled  Marriage." 

Miss  Ferrier  wrote  but  three  novels,  Marriage, 
The  Inheritance,  and  Destiny,  a  period  of  six 
years  intervening  between  the  appearance  of 
each  of  them.  Like  Miss  Burney  and  Miss 
Edgeworth  she  depicts  two  grades  of  society. 
She  shows  forth  the  fashionable  life  of  Edin- 
burgh and  London,  and  the  cruder  mode  of 
living  found  in  the  Scottish  Highlands.  But 
between  her  and  her  models  there  is  the  great 
difference  of  genius  and  talent.  They  passed 
what  they  had  seen  through  the  alembic  of 
imagination;  she  has  depicted  what  she  saw 
with  the  faithfulness  of  the  camera,  and  the 


182    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

crude  realism  of  these  scenes  does  not  always 
blend  with  the  warp  and  woof  of  the  story. 

Like  Miss  Edgeworth,  Miss  Ferrier  had  a 
moral  to  work  out.  She  treats  society  as  a 
satirist,  and  lays  bare  its  heartlessness,  and 
the  unhappiness  of  its  members  who  to  escape 
ennui  are  led  hither  and  thither  by  the  caprice 
of  the  moment.  While  she  may  present  one  side 
of  the  picture,  one  hesitates  to  accept  Lady 
Juliana,  Mrs.  St.  Clair,  or  Lady  Elizabeth  as 
common  types  of  a  London  drawing-room. 

Her  plots  as  well  as  her  characters  suffer  from 
this  conscious  attempt  to  teach  the  happiness 
that  must  follow  the  practice  of  the  Christian 
virtues.  In  Marriage  there  are  two  complete 
stories.  Lady  Juliana  is  the  heroine  of  the 
first  part;  her  two  daughters,  who  are  born  in 
the  first  half,  supplant  their  mother  as  heroines 
of  the  second  half.  The  plot  of  Destiny  is  not 
much  better.  The  denouement  is  tame,  and 
the  characters  lack  consistency.  Tlie  Inherit- 
ance has  the  strongest  plot  of  the  three;  but 
Mrs.  St.  Clair  and  her  secret  interviews  with 
the  monstrosity  Lewiston,  who,  by  the  way, 
has  the  honour  to  be  an  American,  throw  an 
air  of  unreality  over  a  story  in  many  respects 
intensely  real.  In  this  story,  as  in  so  many  old 
novels,  the  nurse's  daughter  had  been  brought 
up  as  the  rightful  heiress.  The  scene  in  which 
she  tells  her  betrothed  lover,  the  heir  of  the 


Miss  Ferrier  183 

estate,  the  story  of  her  birth,  which  she  had  just 
learned,  is  said  to  have  suggested  to  Tennyson 
the  beautiful  ballad  of  Lady  Clare. 

But  when  Miss  Ferrier  sees  loom  in  imagina- 
tion the  sombre  purple  hills  of  the  Highlands, 
with  the  black  tarns  in  the  hollows  half-hidden 
in  mist,  her  genius  awakes.  If  she  had  devoted 
herself  to  these  people  and  this  region,  and 
ignored  the  fashionable  life  of  the  cities,  she 
might  have  written  a  book  worthy  to  be  placed 
beside  the  best  of  Miss  Edgeworth  or  Miss 
Mitford.  At  the  time  she  wrote,  the  Highland 
chief  no  longer  summoned  his  clan  about  him 
at  a  blast  from  his  bugle,  but  he  had  lost  little 
of  his  old-time  picturesqueness.  The  opening 
of  Destiny  describes  the  wealth  of  the  chief  of 
Glenroy : 

"  All  the  world  knows  that  there  is  nothing  on 
earth  to  be  compared  to  a  Highland  chief.  He 
has  his  loch  and  his  islands,  his  mountains  and 
his  castle,  his  piper  and  his  tartan,  his  forests 
and  his  deer,  his  thousands  of  acres  of  untrodden 
heath,  and  his  tens  of  thousands  of  black-faced 
sheep,  and  his  bands  of  bonneted  clansmen, 
with  claymores  and  Gaelic,  and  hot  blood  and 
dirks." 

But  Miss  Ferrier  also  depicted  a  more  sordid 
type  of  Highlander.  Christopher  North  in  his 
Nodes  Ambrosiance  writes  of  her  novels: 

"They  are  the  works  of  a  very  clever  woman, 


184    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

sir,  and  they  have  one  feature  of  true  and  mel- 
ancholy interest  quite  peculiar  to  themselves. 
It  is  in  them  alone  that  the  ultimate  breaking- 
down  and  debasement  of  the  Highland  character 
has  been  depicted.  Sir  Walter  Scott  had  fixed 
the  enamel  of  genius  over  the  last  fitful  gleams 
of  their  half-savage  chivalry,  but  a  humbler  and 
sadder  scene — the  age  of  lucre-banished  clans, 
— of  chieftains  dwindled  into  imitation  squires, 
and  of  chiefs  content  to  barter  the  recollections 
of  a  thousand  years  for  a  few  gaudy  seasons 
of  Almacks  and  Crockfords,  the  euthanasia  of 
kilted  aldermen  and  steamboat  pibrochs,  was 
reserved  for  Miss  Ferrier." 

Besides  her  descriptions  of  the  Highlands, 
Miss  Ferrier  has  drawn  several  Scotch  char- 
acters that  deserve  to  live.  What  a  delightful 
group  is  described  in  Marriage,  consisting  of  the 
three  Misses  Douglas,  known  as  "The  girls," 
and  their  friend  Mrs.  Maclaughlan!  Miss 
Jacky  Douglas,  the  senior  of  the  trio,  "was 
reckoned  a  woman  of  sense";  Miss  Grizzy  was 
distinguished  by  her  good-nature  and  the  en- 
tanglement of  her  thoughts;  and  it  was  said 
that  Miss  Nicky  was  "not  wanting  for  sense 
either";  while  their  friend  Lady  Maclaughlan 
loved  and  tyrannised  over  all  three  of  them. 
Sir  Walter  Scott  admired  the  character  of 
Miss  Becky  Duguid,  a  poor  old  maid,  who 
"was  expected  to  attend  all  accouchements, 


Miss  Ferrier  185 

christenings,  deaths,  chestings,  and  burials,  but 
she  was  seldom  asked  to  a  marriage,  and  never 
to  any  party  of  pleasure."  Joanna  Baillie 
thought  the  loud-spoken  minister,  M'Dow,  a 
true  representative  of  a  few  of  the  Scotch  clergy 
whose  only  aim  is  preferment  and  good  cheer. 
But  none  of  her  other  characters  can  compare 
with  the  devoted  Mrs.  Molly  Macaulay,  the 
friend  of  the  Chief  of  Glenroy  in  Destiny.  When 
Glenroy  has  an  attack  of  palsy,  she  hurries  to 
him,  and  when  she  is  told  that  he  has  missed 
her,  she  exclaims  with  perfect  self-f orgetf ulness : 

"Deed,  and  I  thought  he  would  do  that, 
for  he  has  always  been  so  kind  to  me, — and 
I  thought  sometimes  when  I  was  away,  oh, 
thinks  I  to  myself,  I  wonder  what  Glenroy  will 
do  for  somebody  to  be  angry  with, — for  Ben- 
bowie  's  grown  so  deaf,  poor  creature,  it 's  not 
worth  his  while  to  be  angry  at  him, — and  you  're 
so  gentle  that  it  would  not  do  for  him  to  be 
angry  at  you;  but  I  'm  sure  he  has  a  good  right 
to  be  angry  at  me,  considering  how  kind  he 
has  always  been  to  me." 

Christopher  North  said  of  Molly  Macaulay, 
"  No  sinner  of  our  gender  could  have  adequately 
filled  up  the  outline." 

George  Saintsbury,  considering  the  permanent 
value  of  Miss  Ferrier's  work,  wrote  for  the 
Fortnightly  Review  in  1882: 

"Of  the  four  requisites  of  the  novelist,  plot, 


1 86    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

character,  description,  and  dialogue,  she  is  only 
weak  in  the  first.  The  lapse  of  an  entire  half- 
century  and  a  complete  change  of  manners 
have  put  her  books  to  the  hardest  test  they  are 
ever  likely  to  have  to  endure,  and  they  come 
through  it  triumphantly." 

But,  besides  the  excellences  mentioned  by 
Mr.  Saintsbury,  Miss  Ferrier  is  master  of  humour 
and  pathos.  No  story  is  sadder  than  that  of 
Ronald  Malcolm,  the  hero  of  Destiny.  He  had 
been  willed  the  castle  of  Inch  Orran  with  its 
vast  estates,  but  with  the  provision  that  he  was 
to  have  no  benefit  from  it  until  his  twenty-sixth 
year.  In  case  of  his  death  the  property  was 
to  go  to  his  father,  an  upright  but  poor  man. 
As  Ronald  had  many  years  to  wait  before  he 
could  enjoy  his  riches,  he  entered  the  navy.  His 
ship  was  lost  at  sea  and  the  news  of  his  death 
reported  in  Scotland.  But  Ronald  had  been 
rescued  from  the  sinking  ship,  and  returned  to 
his  father's  cottage.  Here  he  met  a  purblind 
old  woman,  who  told  him  how  his  father,  Captain 
Malcolm,  had  moved  to  the  castle,  and  what 
good  he  was  doing  among  his  tenantry.  She 
described  the  sorrow  of  the  people  at  the  death 
of  Ronald,  but  added:  "Och!  it  was  God's 
providence  to  tak'  the  boy  out  of  his  worthy 
father's  way;  and  noo  a'  thing  's  as  it  should  be, 
and  he  has  gotten  his  ain,  honest  man;  and  long, 
long  may  he  enjoy  it!"  And  then  she  said 


Miss  Ferrier  187 

thankfully,  "The  poor  lad's  death  was  a  great 
blessing — och  ay,  'deed  was  't. "  The  scene 
where  Ronald  goes  to  the  castle  and  looks  in  at 
the  window  upon  the  happy  family  group,  con- 
sisting of  his  father  and  mother,  brothers  and 
sisters,  resembles  in  many  particulars  the  sad 
return  of  Enoch  Arden.  The  close  of  the  scene 
is  as  touching  in  the  novel  as  in  the  poem: 
"  Yes,  yes,  they  are  happy,  and  I  am  forgotten! " 
sobs  the  lad,  as  he  turns  away. 

Miss  Ferrier,  however,  seldom  touches  the 
pathetic;  she  is  first  of  all  a  humourist.  But 
there  is  a  blending  of  the  smiles  and  tears  of 
human  life  in  the  delightful  character  of  Adam 
Ramsay.  Engaged  as  a  boy  to  Lizzie  Lundie, 
he  had  gone  forth  into  the  world  to  make  a 
fortune,  but  when  he  returned  after  many  years 
he  found  that  she  had  married  in  his  absence, 
and  soon  afterwards  had  died.  Crabbed  to  all 
about  him,  he  still  cherished  the  remembrance 
of  his  early  love,  and  was  quickly  moved  by 
any  appeal  to  her  memory. 

The  practical  philosophy  of  the  Scottish 
peasantry  is  amusingly  set  forth  in  the  scene 
where  Miss  St.  Clair  visits  one  of  the  cottages 
on  Lord  Rossville's  estate.  She  found  the 
goodman  very  ill,  and  everything  about  the 
room  betokening  extreme  poverty.  When  she 
offered  to  send  him  milk  and  broth,  and  a  carpet 
and  chairs  to  make  the  room  more  comfortable, 


i88    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

his  wife  interposed,  "A  suit  o'  gude  bein  com- 
fortable dead  claise,  Tammes,  wad  set  ye  better 
than  aw  the  braw  chyres  an'  carpets  i'  the  toon." 
Sometime  afterward,  when  Miss  St.  Clair  called 
to  see  how  the  invalid  was,  she  found  him  in 
the  press-bed,  while  the  clothes  were  warming 
before  the  fire.  His  wife  explained  that  she 
could  not  have  him  in  the  way,  and  if  he  were 
cold,  it  could  not  be  helped,  as  the  clothes  had 
to  be  aired,  and  added,  "An'  I  'm  thinkin'  he  '11 
no  be  lang  o'  wantin'  them  noo. " 

But  notwithstanding  her  humour,  Miss  Ferrier 
was  a  stern  moralist,  whose  attitude  toward 
life  had  been  influenced  indirectly  by  the 
teachings  of  John  Knox.  She  sometimes  seems 
to  stand  her  characters  in  the  stocks,  and  call 
upon  the  populace  to  view  their  sins  or  absurd- 
ities. She  seldom  throws  the  veil  of  charity 
over  them.  Men  as  novelists  are  prone  to 
exaggeration.  Women  have  represented  life 
with  greater  truth  both  in  its  larger  aspects  and 
in  details.  Miss  Ferrier  carries  this  quality  to 
an  extreme.  She  tells  not  only  the  truth,  but, 
with  almost  heartless  honesty,  reveals  the  whole 
of  it,  so  that  many  of  her  men  and  women  are 
repugnant  to  the  reader  while  they  amuse  him. 
The  best  judges  of  Scottish  manners  have  borne 
witness  to  the  exactness  of  her  portraiture. 
She  is,  perhaps,  an  example  of  the  artistic  failure 
of  over-realism. 


Miss  Mitford  189 

Mary  Russell  Mitford  like  Miss  Ferrier  painted 
her  scenes  and  her  portraits  from  real  life.  But 
there  is  as  wide  a  difference  between  their 
writings  as  between  the  rocky  ledges  of  the 
Grampian  Hills  and  the  soft  meadows  bathed 
in  the  sunshine  which  stretch  back  of  the  cot- 
tages of  Our  Village.  Miss  Mitford's,  indeed, 
was  a  sunny  nature,  not  to  be  hardened  nor 
embittered  by  a  lifelong  anxiety  over  poverty 
and  debts.  Her  father,  Dr.  Mitford,  had  spent 
nearly  all  his  own  fortune  when  he  married 
Miss  Mary  Russell,  an  heiress.  Besides  being 
constantly  involved  in  lawsuits,  he  was  addicted 
to  gambling,  and  soon  squandered  the  fortune 
which  his  wife  had  brought  him,  besides  twenty 
thousand  pounds  won  in  a  lottery.  He  is  said 
to  have  lost  in  speculations  and  at  play  about 
seventy  thousand  pounds,  at  that  time  a  large 
fortune.  The  authoress  was  a  little  over  thirty 
years  of  age  when  the  poverty  of  the  family 
forced  them  to  leave  Bertram  House,  their 
home  for  many  years,  and  remove  to  a  little 
labourer's  cottage  about  a  mile  away,  on  the 
principal  street  of  a  little  village  near  Reading, 
known  as  Three  Mile  Cross.  Here  the  support 
of  the  family  devolved  upon  the  daughter,  a 
burden  made  harder  by  the  continual  extrava- 
gance of  the  father,  whom  she  devotedly  loved. 
Although  she  received  large  sums  for  her  writ- 
ings, it  is  with  the  greatest  weariness  that  she 


Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 


writes  to  her  friend  Miss  Barrett,  afterwards 
Mrs.  Browning,  of  the  struggles  that  have  been 
hers  the  greater  part  of  her  life,  the  ten  or  twelve 
hours  of  literary  drudgery  each  day,  often  in 
spite  of  ill  health,  and  her  hope  that  she  may 
always  provide  for  her  father  his  accustomed 
comforts.  Not  only  was  she  enabled  to  do  this, 
but,  through  the  help  of  friends,  to  pay,  after  his 
death,  the  one  thousand  pounds  indebtedness, 
his  only  legacy  to  her. 

Yet  there  is  not  a  trace  of  this  worry  in  the 
delightful  series  of  papers  called  Our  Village, 
which  she  began  to  contribute  at  this  time  to 
the  Lady's  Magazine.  Before  this  she  had  be- 
come known  as  a  poet  and  a  successful  play- 
wright, but  had  believed  herself  incapable  of 
writing  good  prose.  Necessity  revealed  her 
fine  power  of  description,  and  Three  Mile  Cross 
furnished  her  with  scenes  and  characters. 

Our  Village  marked  a  new  style  in  fiction. 
The  year  it  was  commenced,  she  wrote  to  a 
friend  : 

"With  regard  to  novels,  I  should  like  to  see 
one  undertaken  without  any  plot  at  all.  I  do 
not  mean  that  it  should  have  no  story;  but  I 
should  like  some  writer  of  luxuriant  fancy  to 
begin  with  a  certain  set  of  characters  —  one 
family,  for  instance  —  without  any  preconceived 
design  farther  than  one  or  two  incidents  or 
dialogues,  which  would  naturally  suggest  fresh 


Miss  Mitford  191 

matter,  and  so  proceed  in  this  way,  throw- 
ing in  incidents  and  characters  profusely,  but 
avoiding  all  stage  tricks  and  strong  situations, 
till  some  death  or  marriage  should  afford  a 
natural  conclusion  to  the  book. " 

Miss  Mitford  followed  this  plan  as  far  as  her 
great  love  of  nature  would  permit.  For  when 
she  found  her  daily  cares  too  great  to  be  borne 
in  the  little  eight-by-eight  living-room,  she  es- 
caped to  the  woods  and  fields.  She  loved  the 
poets  who  wrote  of  nature,  and  next  to  Miss 
Austen,  whom  she  placed  far  above  any  other 
novelist,  she  delighted  in  the  novels  of  Charlotte 
Smith,  and  in  her  own  pages  there  is  the  same 
true  feeling  for  nature. 

Our  Village  follows  in  a  few  particulars  Gilbert 
White's  History  of  Selborne.  As  he  described 
the  beauties  of  Selborne  through  the  varying 
seasons  of  the  year,  she  describes  her  walks 
about  Three  Mile  Cross,  first  when  the  meadows 
are  covered  with  hoar  frost,  then  when  the  air 
is  perfumed  with  violets,  and  later  when  the 
harvest  field  is  yellow  with  ripened  corn.  All 
the  lanes,  the  favourite  banks,  the  shady  recesses 
are  described  with  delicate  and  loving  touch. 
How  her  own  joyous,  optimistic  nature  speaks 
in  this  record  of  a  morning  walk  in  a  backward 
spring: 

"Cold  bright  weather.  All  within  doors, 
sunny  and  chilly;  all  without,  windy  and  dusty. 


192    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

It  is  quite  tantalising  to  see  that  brilliant  sun 
careering  through  so  beautiful  a  sky,  and  to 
feel  little  more  warmth  from  his  presence  than 
one  does  from  that  of  his  fair  but  cold  sister, 
the  moon.  Even  the  sky,  beautiful  as  it  is,  has 
the  look  of  that  one  sometimes  sees  in  a  very 
bright  moonlight  night — deeply,  intensely  blue, 
with  white  fleecy  clouds  driven  vigorously  along 
by  a  strong  breeze,  now  veiling  and  now  ex- 
posing the  dazzling  luminary  around  whom 
they  sail.  A  beautiful  sky!  and,  in  spite  of  its 
coldness,  a  beautiful  world!" 

But  how  naturally  we  meet  the  people  of  the 
village  and  become  interested  in  them.  There 
is  Harriet,  the  belle  of  the  village,  "a  flirt 
passive,"  who  made  the  tarts  and  puddings 
in  the  author's  kitchen;  Joel  Brent,  her  lover, 
a  carter  by  calling,  but,  by  virtue  of  his  personal 
accomplishments,  the  village  beau.  There  is 
the  publican,  the  carpenter,  the  washerwoman; 
little  Lizzie,  the  spoilt  child,  and  all  the  other 
boys  and  girls  of  the  village.  It  is  very  natural 
to-day  to  meet  these  poor  people  in  novels; 
at  that  time  the  poor  people  of  Ireland  and 
Scotland  had  begun  to  creep  into  fiction,  but 
it  was  as  unusual  in  England  as  a  novel  without 
a  plot.  Even  to-day  Miss  Mitford's  attitude 
toward  these  people  is  not  common.  It  seems 
never  to  have  occurred  to  the  author,  and 
certainly  does  not  to  her  reader?,  that  these  men 


Miss  Mitford  193 

dressed  in  overalls  and  these  women  in  print 
dresses  with  sleeves  rolled  to  the  elbow  were 
not  the  finest  ladies  and  gentlemen  of  the  land. 
She  greets  them  all  with  a  playful  humour 
which  reminds  one  of  the  genial  smile  of  Elia. 
C.  H.  Herford  in  The  Age  of  Wordsworth  wrote 
of  Our  Village: 

"No  such  intimate  and  sympathetic  por- 
trayal of  village  life  had  been  given  before,  and 
perhaps  it  needed  a  woman's  sympathetic  eye 
for  little  things  to  show  the  way.  Of  the  pro- 
fessional story-teller  on  the  alert  for  a  sensation 
there  is  as  little  as  of  the  professional  novelist 
on  the  watch  for  a  lesson. " 

Belford  Regis,  a  series  of  country  and  town 
sketches,  was  written  soon  after  the  completion 
of  Our  Village.  Here  again  is  the  happy  blend- 
ing of  nature  and  humanity;  the  same  fusion 
of  truth  and  fiction.  As  Belford  Regis  is 
"  Our  Market  Town,"  there  is  a  wider  range  of 
characters,  as  different  classes  are  represented; 
and  a  more  intimate  view,  since  the  same  people 
appear  in  more  than  one  story.  Stephen  Lane, 
the  butcher,  and  his  wife  are  often  met  with. 
He  is  so  fat  that  "when  he  walks,  he  overfills 
the  pavement,  and  is  more  difficult  to  pass  than 
a  link  of  full-dressed  misses  or  a  chain  of  be- 
cloaked  dandies."  Of  Mrs.  Lane  she  writes: 
"Butcher's  wife  and  butcher's  daughter  though 
she  were,  yet  was  she  a  graceful  and  gracious 


194    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

woman,  one  of  nature's  gentlewomen  in  look 
and  in  thought."  There  was  Miss  Savage, 
"who  was  called  a  sensible  woman  because 
she  had  a  gruff  voice  and  vinegar  aspect"; 
and  Miss  Steele,  who  was  called  literary,  because 
forty  years  ago  she  made  a  grand  poetical 
collection.  Miss  Mitford  even  does  justice  to 
Mrs.  Hollis,  the  fruiterer  and  the  village  gossip : 
"There  she  sits,  a  tall,  square,  upright  figure, 
surmounted  by  a  pleasant,  comely  face,  eyes 
as  black  as  a  sloe,  cheeks  as  round  as  an  apple, 
and  a  complexion  as  ruddy  as  a  peach,  as  fine 
a  specimen  of  a  healthy,  hearty  English  trades- 
woman, the  feminine  of  John  Bull,  as  one  would 
desire  to  see  on  a  summer's  day.  ...  As  a 
gossip  she  was  incomparable.  She  knew  every- 
body and  everything;  had  always  the  freshest 
intelligence,  and  the  newest  news;  her  reports 
like  her  plums  had  the  bloom  on  them,  and 
she  would  as  much  have  scorned  to  palm 
upon  you  an  old  piece  of  scandal  as  to  send 
you  strawberries  that  had  been  two  days 
gathered." 

A  reviewer  in  the  Athenaum  thus  criticises 
the  book: 

"If  (to  be  hypercritical)  the  pictures  they 
contain  be  a  trifle  too  sunny  and  too  cheerful  to 
be  real — if  they  show  more  generosity  and 
refinement  and  self-sacrifice  existing  among 
the  middle  classes  than  does  exist, — too  much 


Miss  Mitford  195 

of  the  meek  beauty,  too  little  of  the  squalidity 
of  humble  life, — we  love  them  none  the  less, 
and  their  authoress  all  the  more." 

In  Belford  Regis  we  miss  the  fields,  the  brooks, 
the  flowers,  and  the  sky,  which  made  the  charm 
of  Our  Village.  In  some  respects  it  is  a  more 
ambitious  book,  but  it  has  not  the  perennial 
charm  of  Our  Village. 

Miss  Mitford's  favourite  author,  as  we  have 
seen,  was  Jane  Austen.  She  had  the  same 
regard  for  her  that  Miss  Austen  felt  for  Fanny 
Burney.  The  two  authors  have  many  points 
of  resemblance.  Both  have  the  same  clear 
vision,  and  sunny  nature;  the  same  repugnance 
to  all  that  is  sensational,  or  coarse,  or  low;  the 
same  dislike  of  strong  pathos  or  broad  humour; 
and  Miss  Mitford  has  approached  more  closely 
than  any  other  writer  to  the  elegance  of  diction 
and  purity  of  style  of  Miss  Austen. 

They  have  another  point  in  common,  they 
both  show  excellent  taste  in  their  writings. 
This  quality  of  good  taste  is  due  to  native  deli- 
cacy and  refinement,  a  sensitive  withdrawal 
from  what  is  ugly,  and  a  quick  feeling  for  true 
proportion;  the  very  things  which  give  to  a 
woman  her  superior  tact,  which  Ruskin  has 
called  "the  touch  sense."  In  the  novel  it  is 
pre-eminently  a  feminine  characteristic.  Few 
men  have  it  in  a  marked  degree.  It  adds  all 
the  charm  we  feel  in  the  presence  of  a  refined 


196    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

woman  to  the  novels  of  Miss  Edgeworth,  Miss 
Austen,  and  Miss  Mitford. 

But,  while  Miss  Mitford  and  Miss  Austen  have 
many  points  of  resemblance,  they  have  many 
points  of  difference.  Miss  Austen  liked  the 
society  of  men  and  women,  and  during  her 
younger  days  was  fond  of  dinner-parties  and 
balls.  Miss  Mitford  preferred  the  woods  and 
fields,  liked  the  society  of  her  dogs,  and  wrote 
to  a  friend  before  she  was  twenty  that  she 
would  never  go  to  another  dance  if  she  could 
help  it.  Miss  Austen  selects  a  small  group  of 
gentry,  and  by  the  intertwining  of  their  lives 
forms  a  beautiful  plot;  Miss  Mitford  rambles 
through  the  village  and  the  country  walks  of 
Three  Mile  Cross,  and  as  she  meets  the  butcher, 
the  publican,  the  boys  at  cricket,  she  gleans 
some  story  of  interest,  and  brings  back  to  us,  as 
it  were,  a  basket  in  which  have  been  thrown  in 
careless  profusion  violets  and  anemones,  cow- 
slips and  daisies,  and  all  the  other  flowers  of  the 
field. 

Mrs.  Anna  Maria  Hall,  a  country-woman  of 
Miss  Edgeworth,  wrote  of  her  first  novel: 
"My  Sketclws  of  Irish  Character,  my  first  dear 
book,  was  inspired  by  a  desire  to  describe 
my  native  place,  as  Miss  Mitford  had  done  in 
Our  Village,  and  this  made  me  an  author." 
Most  of  these  sketches  were  drawn  from  the 


Anna  Maria  Hall  197 

county  of  Wexford,  her  native  place,  whose 
inhabitants,  she  says  in  the  preface,  are  de- 
scendants of  the  Anglo-Norman  settlers  of  the 
reign  of  Henry  the  Second,  and  speak  a  lan- 
guage unknown  in  other  districts  of  Ireland. 

The  book  is  a  series  of  well-told  stories  of  the 
poor  people,  whom  we  should  have  imagined 
to  be  pure  Celt,  if  the  author  had  not  said  they 
resembled  the  English.  There  is  the  tender 
pathos,  the  quick  humour,  the  joke  which  often 
answers  an  argument,  the  guidance  of  the  heart 
rather  than  the  head;  but  she  has  dwelt  upon 
one  characteristic  but  lightly  touched  upon  by 
Miss  Edgeworth  and  Lady  Morgan,  the  poetic 
feeling  of  the  Celt,  the  imagery  that  so  often 
adorns  their  common  speech.  The  old  Irish 
wife  says  to  the  bride  who  speaks  disrespectfully 
of  the  fairies:  "Hush,  Avourneen!  Sure  they 
have  the  use  of  the  May-dew  before  it  falls,  and 
the  colour  of  the  lilies  and  the  roses  before  it  's 
folded  in  the  tender  buds;  and  can  steal  the 
notes  out  of  the  birds'  throats  while  they  sleep.  " 

The  Irish  Peasantry,  and  Lights  and  Shadows 
of  Irish  Life,  won  Mrs.  Hall  the  ill-will  rather 
than  the  love  of  her  countrymen.  She  had 
lived  for  a  long  time  in  England,  and  upon  re- 
turning to  her  native  land  was  impressed  by  the 
lack  of  forethought  which  kept  the  country 
poor.  Their  early  marriages,  their  indifference 
to  time,  their  frequent  visits  to  the  public  house, 


198    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

their  hospitality  to  strangers  even  when  they 
themselves  were  in  extreme  poverty  and  debt — 
all  made  so  deep  an  impression  upon  her  mind 
that  she  attempted  to  teach  the  Irish  worldly 
wisdom.  But  the  lesson  was  distasteful  to  the 
people  and  probably  useless,  as  the  charac- 
teristics which  she  would  change  were  the  very 
essence  of  the  Irish  nature,  the  traits  which 
made  him  a  Celt,  not  a  Saxon.  In  these  books, 
the  wooings,  weddings,  and  funerals  are  por- 
trayed, and  there  is  a  little  glimpse  of  fairy  lore. 
Midsummer  Eve,  a  Fairy  Tale  of  Love,  grew 
out  of  the  fairy  legends  of  Ireland.  It  is  said 
that  a  child  whose  father  has  died  before  its 
birth  is  placed  by  nature  under  the  peculiar 
guardianship  of  the  fairies;  and,  if  born  on 
Midsummer  Eve,  it  becomes  their  rightful 
property;  they  take  it  to  their  own  homes  and 
leave  in  its  place  one  of  their  changelings.  The 
heroine  of  the  story  is  a  child  of  that  nature, 
over  whose  birth  the  fairies  of  air,  earth,  and 
water  preside.  But  at  the  will  of  Nightstar, 
Queen  of  the  Fairies  of  the  Air,  she  is  left  with 
her  mother,  but  adopted  and  watched  over 
by  the  fairies  as  their  own.  Their  great  'gift 
to  her  is  that  of  loving  and  being  loved.  The 
human  element  is  not  well  blended  with  the 
fairy  element.  The  entire  setting  should  have 
been  rural,  for  in  the  city  of  London,  particularly 
in  the  exhibition  of  the  Royal  Academy,  where 


Anna  Maria  Hall  199 

part  of  the  story  is  placed,  it  is  not  easy  to  keep 
the  tranquil  twilight  atmosphere,  which  fairies 
love.  The  book  is  like  a  song  in  which  the 
bass  and  soprano  are  written  in  different  keys. 
But  when  we  are  back  in  Ireland,  and  the  fairies 
again  appear  and  disappear,  it  is  charming. 
The  old  woodcutter,  Randy,  who  sees  and  talks 
with  the  fairies,  is  a  delightful  creature,  and 
gives  to  the  story  much  of  its  beauty. 

Mrs.  Hall's  novels  have  but  little  literary 
value,  but  she  has  brought  to  light  Irish  charac- 
teristics and  Irish  traditions  which  were  over- 
looked by  her  predecessors,  and  for  that  reason 
they  deserve  to  live. 


CHAPTER  XII 

Lady  Caroline  Lamb.      Mrs.  Shelley 

IT  is  impossible  to  comprehend  the  Byronic 
craze  which  swept  cool-headed  England 
off  her  feet  during  the  regency.  Childe  Harold 
was  the  fashion,  and  many  a  hero  of  romance, 
even  down  to  the  time  of  Pendennis,  aped  his 
fashions.  Disraeli  and  Bulwer  were  among 
his  disciples.  Bulwer's  early  novels,  Falkland 
and  Pelham,  were  influenced  by  him;  and 
Vivian  Grey  and  Venetia  might  have  been  the 
offspring  of  Byron's  prose  brain,  so  completely 
was  Disraeli  under  his  influence  at  the  time. 

The  poorest  of  the  novels  of  this  class,  but 
the  one  which  gives  the  most  intimate  picture 
of  Byron,  is  Glenarvon,  by  Lady  Caroline  Lamb. 
Its  hero  is  Byron.  The  plot  follows  the  outlines 
of  her  own  life,  and  all  the  characters  were 
counterparts  of  living  people  whom  she  knew. 
Calantha,  the  heroine,  representing  Lady  Caro- 
line, is  married  to  Lord  Avondale,  or  William 
Lamb,  better  known  as  Lord  Melbourne,  at 
one  time  Premier  of  England.  Lord  and  Lady 
Avondale  are  very  happy,  until  Glenarvon, 
200 


Lady  Caroline  Lamb         201 

"the  spirit  of  evil,"  appears  and  dazzles  Calan- 
tha.  Twice  she  is  about  to  elope  with  him, 
but  the  thought  of  her  husband  and  children 
keeps  her  back.  They  part,  and  for  a  time 
tender  billets-doux  pass  between  them,  until 
Calantha  receives  a  cruel  letter  from  Glenarvon, 
in  which  he  bids  her  leave  him  in  peace.  Other 
well-known  people  appeared  in  the  book.  Lord 
Holland  was  the  Great  Nabob,  Lady  Holland 
was  the  Princess  of  Madagascar,  and  Samuel 
Rogers  was  the  Yellow  Hyena  or  the  Pale  Poet. 
The  novel  had  also  a  moral  purpose;  it  was 
intended  to  show  the  danger  of  a  life  devoted 
to  pleasure  and  fashion. 

Of  course  the  book  made  a  sensation.  Lady 
Caroline  Lamb,  the  daughter  of  Earl  Bessbor- 
ough,  the  granddaughter  of  Earl  Spencer,  re- 
lated to  nearly  all  the  great  houses  of  England, 
had  all  her  life  followed  every  impulse  of  a  too 
susceptible  imagination.  Her  infatuation  for 
Lord  Byron  had  long  been  a  theme  for  gossip 
throughout  London.  She  invited  him  con- 
stantly to  her  home;  went  to  assemblies  in  his 
carriage;  and,  if  he  were  invited  to  parties  to 
which  she  was  not,  walked  the  streets  to  meet 
him;  she  confided  to  every  chance  acquaint- 
ance that  she  was  dying  of  love  for  him.  Yet, 
as  one  reads  of  this  affair,  one  suspects  that  this 
devotion  was  nothing  more  than  the  infatua- 
tion of  a  high-strung  nature  for  the  hero  of  a 


202    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

romance.  In  writing  to  a  friend  about  her 
husband,  she  says,  "He  was  privy  to  my  affair 
with  Lord  Byron  and  laughed  at  it."  On  her 
death-bed  she  said  of  her  husband,  "But  re- 
member, the  only  noble  fellow  I  ever  met  with 
was  William  Lamb." 

A  month  after  her  death,  Lord  Melbourne 
wrote  a  sketch  of  her  life  for  the  Literary  Ga- 
zette. In  this  he  said: 

"Her  character  it  is  difficult  to  analyse, 
because,  owing  to  the  extreme  susceptibility 
of  her  imagination,  and  the  unhesitating  and 
rapid  manner  in  which  she  followed  its  impulses, 
her  conduct  was  one  perpetual  kaleidoscope  of 
changes.  ...  To  the  poor  she  was  invariably 
charitable — she  was  more:  in  spite  of  her  ordi- 
nary thoughtlessness  of  self,  for  them  she  had 
consideration  as  well  as  generosity,  and  delicacy 
no  less  than  relief.  For  her  friends  she  had  a 
ready  and  active  love ;  for  her  enemies  no  hatred : 
never  perhaps  was  there  a  human  being  who  had 
less  malevolence;  as  all  hef  errors  hurt  only 
herself,  so  against  herself  only  were  levelled  her 
accusation  and  reproach." 

How  far  Byron  was  in  earnest  in  this  tragi- 
comedy is  more  difficult  to  determine.  In  one 
letter  to  her  he  writes:  "I  was  and  am  yours, 
freely  and  entirely,  to  obey,  to  honour,  to  love, 
and  fly  with  you,  where,  when,  and  how  your- 
self might  and  may  determine."  That  Byron 


Lady  Caroline  Lamb         203 

was  piqued  when  he  read  the  book,  his  letter  to 
Moore  proves:  "By  the  way,  I  suppose  you 
have  seen  Glenarvon.  It  seems  to  me  if  the 
authoress  had  written  the  truth — the  whole 
truth — the  romance  would  not  only  have 
been  more  romantic,  but  more  entertaining. 
As  for  the  likeness,  the  picture  can't  be  good; 
I  did  not  sit  long  enough. "  It  was  not  pleasing 
to  Lord  Byron's  vanity  to  appear  in  her  book 
as  the  spirit  of  evil,  beside  her  husband,  a 
high-minded  gentleman,  ready  to  sacrifice  for 
his  friends  everything  "but  his  honour  and 
integrity." 

Notwithstanding  the  humorous  elements  in 
the  connection  of  Lord  Byron  and  Lady  Caroline 
Lamb,  the  story  is  pathetic.  His  poetic  per- 
sonality attracted  her  as  the  light  does  the  poor 
moth.  Disraeli  caricatured  her  in  the  char- 
acter of  Mrs.  Felix  Lorraine  in  Vivian  Grey, 
and  introduced  her  into  Venetia  under  the  title 
of  Lady  Monteagle,  where  he  made  much  of 
her  love  for  the  poet  Cadurcis,  otherwise  Lord 
Byron. 

Lady  Caroline  Lamb  wrote  two  other  novels, 
but  they  are  of  no  value.  In  her  third,  Ada 
Reis,  considered  her  best,  she  introduced  Bulwer 
as  the  good  spirit. 

The  little  poem  written  by  Lady  Caroline 
Lamb  on  the  day  fixed  for  her  departure  from 
Brocket  Hall,  after  it  had  been  decided  that 


204    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

she  was  to  live  in  retirement  away  from  her 
husband  and  son,  shows  tenderness  and  poetic 
feeling: 

They  dance — they  sing — they  bless  the  day, 
I  weep  the  while — and  well  I  may : 
Husband,  nor  child,  to  greet  me  come, 
Without  a  friend — without  a  home: 
I  sit  beneath  my  favourite  tree, 
Sing  then,  my  little  birds,  to  me, 
In  music,  love,  and  liberty. 

At  the  time  that  the  British  public  was  smil- 
ing graciously,  even  if  a  little  humorously,  upon 
Lady  Caroline  Lamb,  and  was  lionising  Lord 
Byron,  it  spurned  from  its  presence  with  the 
greatest  disdain  Percy  and  Mary  Shelley.  Even 
after  the  death  of  Shelley,  when  Mary  returned 
to  London  with  herself  and  son  to  support,  it 
received  her  as  the  prodigal  daughter  for  whom 
the  crumbs  from  the  rich  man's  table  must 
suffice. 

Mary  Shelley  had  inherited  from  her  mother 
the  world's  frown.  Mary  Wollstonecraft  God- 
win had  been,  the  greater  part  of  her  life,  at 
variance  with  society.  She  was  the  author,  as 
has  been  said,  of  the  Vindication  of  the  Rights 
of  Woman,  and  had  for  a  long  time  been  an 
opponent  of  marriage,  chiefly  because  the  civil 
laws  pertaining  to  it  deprived  both  husband 
and  wife  of  their  proper  liberty.  Her  bitter 
experience  with  Imlay  had,  however,  so  modi- 


Mrs.  Shelley  205 

fied  her  views  on  this  latter  subject  that  she 
became  the  wife  of  William  Godwin  a  short 
time  before  the  birth  of  their  daughter  Mary, 
who  in  after  years  became  Mrs.  Shelley.  Al- 
though her  mother  died  at  her  birth,  Mary 
Godwin  was  deeply  imbued  with  her  theories 
of  life.  She  had  read  her  books,  and  had  often 
heard  her  father  express  the  same  views  con- 
cerning the  bondage  of  marriage  and  its  use- 
lessness.  Her  elopement  with  Shelley  while 
his  wife  Harriet  was  still  living  gains  a  certain 
sanction  from  the  fact  that  she  plighted  her 
troth  to  him  at  her  mother's  grave.  After  the 
sad  death  of  Harriet,  however,  Shelley  and 
Mary  Godwin  conceded  to  the  world's  opinion, 
and  were  legally  married.  But  the  anger  of 
society  was  not  appeased,  and,  even  after  both 
had  become  famous,  it  continued  to  ignore  the 
poet  Shelley  and  his  gifted  wife. 

At  the  age  of  nineteen  Mrs.  Shelley  was  led 
to  write  her  first  novel.  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Shelley 
and  Byron  were  spending  the  summer  of  1816 
in  the  mountains  of  Switzerland.  Continuous 
rain  kept  them  in-doors,  where  they  passed 
the  time  in  reading  ghost  stories.  At  the  sug- 
gestion of  Byron,  each  one  agreed  to  write  a 
blood-curdling  tale.  It  is  one  of  the  strange 
freaks  of  invention  that  this  young  girl  suc- 
ceeded where  Shelley  and  Byron  failed.  Byron 
wrote  a  fragment  of  a  story  which  was  printed 


206    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

with  Mazeppa.  Shelley  also  began  a  story, 
but  when  he  had  reduced  his  characters  to  a 
most  pitiable  condition,  he  wearied  of  them  and 
could  devise  no  way  to  bring  the  tale  to  a  fitting 
conclusion.  After  listening  to  a  conversation 
between  the  two  poets  upon  the  possibilities  of 
science  discovering  the  secrets  of  life,  the  story 
known  as  Frankenstein,  or  the  Modern  Pro- 
metheus shaped  itself  in  Mary's  mind. 

Frankenstein  is  one  of  those  novels  that 
defy  the  critic.  Everyone  recognises  that  the 
letters  written  by  Captain  Walton  to  his  sister 
in  which  he  tells  of  his  meeting  with  Franken- 
stein, and  repeats  to  her  the  story  he  has  just 
heard  from  his  guest,  makes  an  awkward  intro- 
duction to  the  real  narrative.  Yet  all  this  part 
about  Captain  Walton  and  his.  crew  was  added 
at  the  suggestion  of  Shelley  after  the  rest  of  the 
story  had  been  written.  But  the  narrative  of 
Frankenstein  is  so  powerful,  so  real,  that,  once 
read,  it  can  never  be  forgotten.  Mrs.  Shelley 
wrote  in  the  introduction  of  the  edition  of  1839 
that,  before  writing  it,  she  was  trying  to  think 
of  a  story,  "one  that  would  speak  to  the  mys- 
terious fears  of  our  nature,  and  awaken  thrilling 
horror — one  to  make  the  reader  dread  to  look 
round,  to  curdle  the  blood  and  quicken  the 
beatings  of  the  heart."  That  she  has  done 
this  the  experience  of  every  reader  will  prove. 

But   the    story  has   a  greater    hold    on   the 


Mrs.  Shelley  207 

imagination  than  this  alone  would  give  it.  The 
monster  created  by  Frankenstein  is  closely  re- 
lated to  our  own  human  nature.  "My  heart 
was  fashioned  to  be  susceptible  of  love  and 
sympathy,"  he  says,  "and,  when  wrenched  by 
misery  to  vice  and  hatred,  it  did  not  endure  the 
violence  of  the  change  without  torture,  such 
as  you  cannot  even  imagine. "  There  is  a  won- 
derful blending  of  good  and  evil  in  this  demon, 
and,  while  the  magnitude  of  his  crimes  makes  us 
shudder,  his  wrongs  and  his  loneliness  awaken 
our  pity.  "The  fallen  angel  becomes  a  malig- 
nant devil.  Yet  even  that  enemy  of  God  and 
man  had  friends  and  associates  in  his  desolation ; 
I  am  quite  alone,"  the  monster  complains  to  his 
creator.  Who  can  forget  the  scene  where  he 
watches  Frankenstein  at  work  making  for  him 
the  companion  that  he  had  promised?  Perhaps 
sadder  than  the  story  of  the  monster  is  that  of 
Frankenstein,  who,  led  by  a  desire  to  widen 
human  knowledge,  finds  that  the  fulfilment  of 
his  lofty  ambition  has  brought  only  a  curse  to 
mankind. 

In  1823,  Mary  Shelley  published  a  second 
novel,  Valperga,  so  named  from  a  castle  and 
small  independent  territory  near  Lucca.  Cas- 
truccio  Castracani,  whose  life  Machiavelli  has 
told,  is  the  hero  of  the  story.  The  greatest 
soldier  and  satirist  of  his  times,  the  man  of  the 
novel  is  considered  inferior  to  the  man  of 


208    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

history.  Mrs.  Shelley  had  read  broadly  before 
beginning  the  book,  and  she  has  described 
minutely  the  customs  of  the  age  about  which 
she  is  writing.  Shelley  pronounced  it  "a 
living  and  moving  picture  of  an  age  almost 
forgotten." 

The  interest  centres  in  the  two  heroines, 
Euthanasia,  Countess  of  Valperga,  and  Beatrice, 
Prophetess  of  Ferrara.  Strong,  intellectual, 
and  passionate,  not  until  the  time  of  George 
Eliot  did  women  of  this  type  become  prominent 
in  fiction.  Euthanasia,  a  Guelph  and  a  Floren- 
tine, with  a  soul  "adapted  for  the  reception  of 
all  good,"  was  betrothed  to  the  youth  Cas- 
truccio,  whom  she  at  that  time  loved.  Later, 
when  his  character  deteriorated  under  the  in- 
fluence of  selfish  ambition,  she  ceased  to  love 
him,  and  said,  "He  cast  off  humanity,  honesty, 
honourable  feeling,  all  that  I  prize. "  Castruccio 
belonged  to  the  Ghibelines,  so  that  the  story 
of  their  love  is  intertwined  with  the  struggle 
between  these  two  parties  in  Italy. 

But  more  beautiful  than  the  intellectual 
character  of  Euthanasia,  is  the  spiritual  one  of 
Beatrice,  the  adopted  daughter  of  the  bishop  of 
Ferrara,  who  is  regarded  with  feelings  of  rever- 
ence by  her  countrymen,  because  of  her  prophetic 
powers.  Pure  and  deeply  religious,  she  accepted 
all  the  suggestions  of  her  mind  as  a  message  from 
God.  When  Castruccio  came  to  Ferrara  and 


Mrs.  Shelley  209 

was  entertained  by  the  bishop  as  the  prince 
and  liberator  of  his  country,  she  believed  that 
together  they  could  accomplish  much  for  her 
beloved  country:  "She  prayed  to  the  Virgin  to 
inspire  her;  and,  again  giving  herself  up  to 
reverie,  she  wove  a  subtle  web,  whose  materials 
she  believed  heavenly,  but  which  were  indeed 
stolen  from  the  glowing  wings  of  love."  No 
wonder  she  believed  the  dictates  of  her  own 
heart,  she  whose  words  the  superstition  of  the 
age  had  so  often  declared  miraculous.  She 
was  barely  seventeen  and  she  loved  for  the  first 
time.  How  pathetic  is  her  disillusionment  when 
Castruccio  bade  her  farewell  for  a  season,  as 
he  was  about  to  leave  Ferrara.  She  had  be- 
lieved that  the  Holy  Spirit  had  brought  Cas- 
truccio to  her  that  by  the  union  of  his  manly 
qualities  and  her  divine  attributes  some  great 
work  might  be  fulfilled.  But  as  he  left  her, 
he  spoke  only  of  earthly  happiness: 

"It  was  her  heart,  her  whole  soul  she  had 
given ;  her  understanding,  her  prophetic  powers, 
all  the  little  universe  that  with  her  ardent  spirit 
she  grasped  and  possessed,  she  had  surrendered, 
fully,  and  without  reserve;  but,  alas!  the  most 
worthless  part  alone  had  been  accepted,  and  the 
rest  cast  as  dust  upon  the  winds." 

Afterwards,  when  she  wandered  forth  a 
beggar,  and  was  rescued  by  Euthanasia,  she 
exclaimed  to  her: 


210    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

"You  either  worship  a  useless  shadow,  or  a 
fiend  in  the  clothing  of  a  God. " 

The  daughter  of  Mary  Wollstonecraft  could 
fully  sympathise  with  Beatrice.  In  the  grief, 
almost  madness,  with  which  Beatrice  realises 
her  self-deception,  there  are  traces  of  Franken- 
stein. Perhaps  no  problem  plucked  from  the 
tree  of  good  and  evil  was  so  ever-present  to 
Mary  Shelley  as  why  misery  so  often  follows 
an  obedience  to  the  highest  dictates  of  the  soul. 
Both  her  father  and  mother  had  experienced 
this ;  and  she  and  Shelley  had  tasted  of  the  same 
bitter  fruit.  In  the  analysis  of  Beatrice's  emo- 
tions Mrs.  Shelley  shows  herself  akin  to  Charlotte 
Bronte. 

Three  years  after  the  death  of  Shelley,  she 
published  The  Last  Man.  It  relates  to  England 
in  the  year  2073  when,  the  king  having  abdicated 
his  throne,  England  had  become  a  republic. 
Soon  after  this,  however  a  pestilence  fell  upon 
the  people,  which  drove  them  upon  the  conti- 
nent, where  they  travelled  southward,  until 
only  one  man  remained.  The  plot  is  clumsy; 
the  characters  are  abstractions. 

But  the  feelings  of  the  author,  written  in 
clear  letters  on  every  page,  are  a  valuable 
addition  to  the  history  of  the  poet  Shelley  and 
his  wife.  Besides  her  fresh  sorrow  for  her  hus- 
band, Byron  had  died  only  the  year  before.  Her 
mind  was  brooding  on  the  days  the  three  had 


Mrs.  Shelley  211 

spent  together.  Her  grief  was  too  recent  to  be 
shaken  from  her  mind  or  lost  sight  of  in  her  imag- 
inative work.  Shelley,  and  the  scenes  she  had 
looked  on  with  him,  the  conversations  between 
him  and  his  friends,  creep  in  on  every  page. 
Lionel  Verney,  the  Last  Man,  is  the  supposed 
narrator  of  the  story.  He  thus  describes  Adrian , 
the  son  of  the  king:  "A  tall,  slim,  fair  boy,  with 
a  physiognomy  expressive  of  the  excess  of  sensi- 
bility and  refinement,  stood  before  me;  the 
morning  sunbeams  tinged  with  gold  his  silken 
hair,  and  spread  light  and  glory  over  his  beam- 
ing countenance  ...  he  seemed  like  an  inspired 
musician,  who  struck,  with  unerring  skill,  the 
'lyre  of  mind,'  and  produced  thence  divinest  har- 
mony. .  .  .  His  slight  frame  was  ovei  informed 
by  the  soul  that  dwelt  within.  .  .  .  He  was  gay  as 
a  lark  carrolling  from  its  skiey  tower.  .  .  .  The 
young  and  inexperienced  did  not  understand 
the  lofty  severity  of  his  moral  views,  and  dis- 
liked him  as  a  being  different  from  themselves." 
Shelley,  of  course,  was  the  original  of  this  pic- 
ture. Lord  Byron  suggested  the  character  of 
Lord  Raymond:  "The  earth  was  spread  out  as 
a  highway  for  him;  the  heavens  built  up  as  a 
canopy  for  him."  "Every  trait  spoke  predom- 
inate self-will;  his  smile  was  pleasing,  though 
disdain  too  often  curled  his  lips — lips  which  to 
female  eyes  were  the  very  throne  of  beauty  and 
love.  .  .  ,  Thus  full  of  contradictions,  unbending 


212    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

yet  haughty,  gentle  yet  fierce,  tender  and  again 
neglectful,  he  by  some  strange  art  found  easy 
entrance  to  the  admiration  and  affection  of 
women;  now  caressing  and  now  tyrannising 
over  them  according  to  his  mood,  but  in  every 
change  a  despot." 

A  large  part  of  the  three  volumes  is  taken 
up  with  a  characterisation  of  Adrian  and  Lord 
Raymond,  the  latter  of  whom  falls  when  right- 
ing for  the  Greeks.  How  impossible  it  was  for 
her  to  rid  her  mind  of  her  own  sorrow  is  shown 
at  the  end  of  the  third  volume,  where  Adrian 
is  drowned,  and  Lionel  Verney  is  left  alone. 
He  thus  says  of  his  friend : 

"All  I  had  possessed  of  this  world's  goods, 
of  happiness,  knowledge,  or  virtue — I  owed  to 
him.  He  had,  in  his  person,  his  intellect,  and 
rare  qualities,  given  a  glory  to  my  life,  which 
without  him  it  had  never  known.  Beyond  all 
other  beings  he  had  taught  me  that  goodness, 
pure  and  simple,  can  be  an  attribute  of  man." 

Mrs.  Shelley  made  the  great  mistake  of  writ- 
ing this  novel  in  the  first  person.  The  Last 
Man,  who  is  telling  the  story,  although  he  has 
the  name  of  Lionel,  is-  most  assuredly  of  the 
female  sex.  The  friendship  between  him  and 
Adrian  is  not  the  friendship  of  man  for  man, 
but  rather  the  love  of  man  and  woman. 

Mrs.  Shelley's  next  novel,  Lodore,  written  in 
1835,  thirteen  years  after  the  death  of  her  hus- 


Mrs.  Shelley  213 

band,  had  a  better  outlined  plot  and  more  defi- 
nite characters.  But  again  it  echoes  the  past. 
Lord  Byron's  unhappy  married  relations  and 
Shelley's  troubles  with  Harriet  are  blended  in 
the  story,  Lord  Byron  furnishing  the  character 
in  some  respects  of  Lord  Lodore,  while  his  wife, 
Cornelia  Santerre,  resembles  both  Harriet  and 
Lady  Byron.  Lady  Santerre,  the  mother  of 
Cornelia,  augments  the  trouble  between  Lord 
and  Lady  Lodore,  and,  contrary  to  the  evident 
intentions  of  the  writer,  the  reader's  sympathies 
are  largely  with  Cornelia  and  Lady  Santerre. 
When  Lodore  wishes  Cornelia  to  go  to  America 
to  save  him  from  disgrace,  Lady  Santerre 
objects  to  her  daughter's  accompanying  him : 

"  He  will  soon  grow  tired  of  playing  the  tragic 
hero  on  a  stage  surrounded  by  no  spectators; 
he  will  discover  the  folly  of  his  conduct;  he  will 
return,  and  plead  for  forgiveness,  and  feel  that 
he  is  too  fortunate  in  a  wife  who  has  preserved 
her  own  conduct  free  from  censure  and  remark 
while  he  has  made  himself  a  laughing-stock  to 
all." 

These  words  strangely  bring  to  mind  Lord 
Byron  as  having  evoked  them. 

Again  Lady  Lodore 's  letter  to  her  husband 
at  the  time  of  his  departure  to  America  reminds 
one  of  Lady  Byron: 

"If  heaven  have  blessings  for  the  coldly 
egotistical,  the  unfeeling  despot,  may  those 


214    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

blessings  be  yours;  but  do  not  dare  to  interfere 
with  emotions  too  pure,  too  disinterested  for 
you  ever  to  understand.  Give  me  my  child, 
and  fear  neither  my  interference  nor  resent- 
ment. " 

Lady  Lodore's  character  changes  in  the  book, 
and  becomes  more  like  that  of  Harriet  Shelley. 
As  Mrs.  Shelley  wrote,  fragments  of  the  past 
evidently  came  into  her  mind  and  influenced 
her  pen,  and  her  original  conception  of  the 
characters  was  forgotten.  Clorinda,  the  beau- 
tiful, eloquent,  and  passionate  Neapolitan,  was 
drawn  from  Emilia  Viviani,  who  had  suggested 
to  Shelley  his  poem  Epipsychidion,  while  both 
Horatio  Saville,  who  had  "no  thought  but  for 
the  nobler  creations  of  the  soul,  and  the  dis- 
cernment of  the  sublime  laws  of  God  and 
nature,"  and  his  cousin  Villiers,  also  an  enthu- 
siastic worshipper  of  nature,  possessed  many  of 
Shelley's  qualities. 

Besides  two  other  novels  of  no  value,  Perkin 
Warbeck  and  Falkner,  Mrs.  Shelley  wrote  numer- 
ous short  stories  for  the  annuals,  at  that  time 
so  much  in  vogue.  In  1891,  these  were  col- 
lected and  edited  with  an  appreciative  criti- 
cism by  Sir  Richard  Garnett.  Many  of  them 
have  the  intensity  and  sustained  interest  of 
Frankenstein. 

After  the  death  of  her  husband,  grief  and 
trouble  dimmed  Mrs.  Shelley's  imagination. 


Mrs.  Shelley  215 

But  the  pale  student  Frankenstein,  the  mon- 
ster he  created,  and  the  beautiful  priestess, 
Beatrice,  three  strong  conceptions,  testify  to 
the  genius  of  Mary  Shelley. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

Mrs.  Gore.     Mrs.  Bray 

DURING  the  second  decade  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  while  Scott  was  writing 
some  of  the  most  powerful  of  the  Waverley 
novels,  a  host  of  new  writers  sprang  into  popu- 
lar notice.  John  Gait,  William  Harrison  Ains- 
worth,  and  G.  P.  R.  James  began  their  endless 
series  of  historical  romances,  while  in  1827, 
Bulwer  Lytton  and  Benjamin  Disraeli  intro- 
duced to  the  reading  public,  as  the  represen- 
tatives of  fashionable  society,  Falkland  and 
Vivian  Grey.  The  decade  was  prolific  also  in 
novels  by  women.  Jane  Austen  had  died  in  181 7, 
but  Maria  Edgeworth,  Lady  Morgan,  the  Por- 
ters, Amelia  Opie,  Miss  Ferrier,  Mrs.  Shelley  and 
Miss  Mitford  were  still  writing;  during  this 
period,  Mrs.  S.  C.  Hall  began  her  work  in  imi- 
tation of  Miss  Mitford,  while  Mrs.  Gore  and 
Mrs.  Bray  took  up  the  goose-quill,  piled  reams 
of  paper  on  their  desks,  and  began  their  literary 
careers. 

About   a   score   of   years   before   Thackeray 
tickled  English  society  with  pictures  of  its  own 
216 


Mrs.  Gore  217 

snobbery,  Mrs.  Gore,  a  young  woman,  wife  of 
an  officer  in  the  Life  Guards,  saw  through  the 
many  affectations  of  the  polite  world,  and  in  a 
series  of  novels,  pointed  out  its  ludicrous  pre- 
tences with  lively  wit.  Mrs.  Gore  has  suffered, 
however,  from  the  multiplicity  of  her  writings. 
During  the  years  between  1823,  when  she  wrote 
her  first  novel,  Theresa  Marchmont,  and  1850, 
when,  quite  blind,  she  retired  from  the  world  of 
letters,  she  published  two  hundred  volumes  of 
novels,  plays,  and  poems.  Her  plots  are  often 
hastily  constructed,  her  men  and  women  dimly 
outlined,  but  she  is  never  dull.  No  writer 
since  Congreve  has  so  many  sparkling  lines. 
She  has  been  likened  to  Horace,  and  if  we  com- 
pare her  wit  with  that  of  Thackeray,  who  by  the 
way  ridiculed  her  in  his  Novels  by  Eminent 
Hands,  her  humour  has  qualities  of  old  Fal- 
ernian,  beside  which  his  too  frequently  has  the 
bitter  flavour  of  old  English  beei.  The  English- 
man is  inclined  to  take  his  wit,  like  his  sports, 
too  seriously,  and  to  mingle  with  it  a  little  of 
the  spice  of  envy.  Mrs.  Gore  has  none  of  this, 
however,  and  skims  along  the  surface  of  fashion- 
able life  with  a  grace  and  ease  and  humour 
extremely  diverting. 

Her  writings  are  so  voluminous  that  one  can 
only  make  excerpts  at  random.  One  of  the 
liveliest  is  Cecil,  or  the  Adventures  of  a  Coxcomb, 
a  humorous  satire  on  Vivian  Grey.  "The  arch- 


2i8    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

coxcomb  of  his  coxcombical  time"  had  become 
a  coxcomb  at  the  age  of  six  months,  when  he 
first  saw  himself  in  the  mirror,  from  which  time 
his  nurse  stopped  his  crying  by  tossing  him  in 
front  of  a  looking-glass.  His  curls  made  him 
so  attractive  that  at  six  years  of  age  he  was 
admitted  to  his  mother's  boudoir,  from  which 
his  red-headed  brother  was  excluded,  and  he 
superseded  the  spaniel  in  her  ladyship's  carriage. 
With  the  loss  of  his  curls  went  the  loss  of  favour. 
He  did  not  prosper  at  school,  and  was  rusticated 
after  a  year's  residence  at  Oxford.  Here  he 
formed  an  acquaintance  which  helped  him  much 
in  the  world  of  coxcombry.  Though  this  man 
was  not  well  born,  he  was  an  admitted  leader 
among  gentlemen.  Cecil  soon  discovered  that 
his  high  social  position  was  due  entirely  to  his 
impertinence,  and  he  made  this  wise  observa- 
tion: "Impudence  is  the  quality  of  a  footman; 
impertinence  of  his  master.  Impudence  is  a 
thing  to  be  rebutted  with  brute  force;  imperti- 
nence requires  wit  for  the  putting  down."  So 
he  matched  his  wit  with  this  man's  imperti- 
nence, and  they  became  sworn  friends. 

When  Cecil  went  to  London,  he  found  that 
"people  had  supped  full  of  horrors,  during  the 
Revolution,  and  were  now  devoted  to  elegiac 
measures.  My  languid  smile  and  hazel  eyes 
were  the  very  thing  to  settle  the  business  of  the 
devoted  beings  left  for  execution."  Of  course 


Mrs.  Gore  219 

all  the  women  fell  desperately  in  love  with  him. 
"I  had  always  a  predisposition  to  woman- 
slaughter,  with  extenuating  circumstances,  as 
well  as  a  stirring  consciousness  of  the  extermi- 
nating power, "  he  explains  to  us.  Like  Childe 
Harold  and  Vivian  Grey,  this  coxcomb  soon 
became  weary  of  London,  and  travelled  through 
Europe  in  an  indolent  way,  for  after  all  it  was 
his  chief  pleasure  "to  lie  in  an  airy  French 
bed,  showered  over  with  blue  convolvulus," 
and  read  tender  billets  from  the  ladies.  This 
book  was  an  excellent  antidote  to  the  Byronic 
fever,  then  at  its  height. 

In  her  Sketches  of  English  Character,  Mrs. 
Gore  describes  different  men  who  were  in  her 
time  to  be  met  with  in  the  social  life  of  London. 
The  Dining-Out  Man  thus  speaks  for  himself: 

"  Ill-natured  people  fancy  that  the  life  of  a 
dining-out  man  is  a  life  of  corn,  wine,  and  oil; 
that  all  he  has  to  do  is  to  eat,  drink  and  be 
merry.  I  only  know  that,  had  I  been  aware  in 
the  onset  of  life,  of  all  I  should  have  to  go 
through  in  my  vocation,  I  would  have  chosen 
some  easier  calling.  I  would  have  studied  law, 
physic,  or  divinity." 

In  the  sketches  of  The  Clubman,  she  as- 
signs John  Bull's  dislike  of  ladies'  society  as 
the  reason  for  the  many  clubs  in  the  English 
metropolis : 

"While  admitting  woman  to  be  a  divinity, 


220    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

he  chooses  to  conceal  his  idol  in  the  Holy  of 
Holies  of  domestic  life.  Duly  to  enjoy  the 
society  of  Mrs.  Bull,  he  chooses  a  smoking 
tureen,  and  cod's  head  and  shoulders  to  inter- 
vene between  them,  and  their  olive  branches 
to  be  around  their  table.  .  .  .  For  John  adores 
woman  in  the  singular,  and  hates  her  in  the 
plural;  John  loves,  but  does  not  like.  Woman 
is  the  object  of  his  passion,  rarely  of  his  regard. 
There  is  nothing  in  the  gaiety  of  heart  or  spright- 
liness  of  intellect  of  the  weaker  sex  which  he 
considers  an  addition  to  society.  To  him 
women  are  an  interruption  to  business  and 
pleasure." 

Mrs.  Gore  could  also  unveil  hypocrisy.  In 
her  novel  Preferment,  or  My  Uncle  the  Earl,  she 
thus  describes  a  worthy  ornament  of  the  church : 

"The  Dean  of  Darbington  glided  along  his 
golden  railroad — 'mild  as  moonbeams' — soft  as 
a  swansdown  muff — insinuating  as  a  silken 
eared  spaniel.  His  conciliating  arguments 
were  whispered  in  a  tone  suitable  to  the  sick 
chamber  of  a  nervous  hypochondriac,  and  his 
strain  of  argument  resembled  its  potations  of 
thin,  weak,  well-sweetened  barley  water.  While 
Dr.  Macnab  succeeded  with  his  congregation 
by  kicking  and  bullying  them  along  the  path 
of  grace,  Dr.  Nicewig  held  out  his  ringer  with 
a  coaxing  air  and  gentle  chirrup,  like  a  bird- 
fancier  decoying  a  canary. " 


Mrs.  Gore  221 

A  critic  in  the  Westminster  Review  in  1831 
thus  writes  of  her: 

"Mrs.  Gore  has  a  perfectly  feminine  know- 
ledge of  all  the  weaknesses  and  absurdities 
of  an  ordinary  man  of  fashion,  following  the 
routine  of  London  life  in  the  season.  She 
unmasks  his  selfishness  with  admirable  acute- 
ness;  she  exposes  his  unromantic  egotism,  with 
delightful  sauciness.  Her  portraits  of  women 
are  also  executed  with  great  spirit;  but  not 
with  the  same  truth.  In  transferring  men  to 
her  canvas,  she  has  relied  upon  the  faculty  of 
observation,  usually  fine  and  vigilant  in  a 
woman;  but  when  portraying  her  own  sex,  the 
authoress  has  perhaps  looked  within;  and  the 
study  of  the  internal  operations  of  the  human 
machine  is  a  far  more  complex  affair,  and  re- 
quires far  more  extensive  experience,  and  also 
different  faculties,  from  those  necessary  to  ac- 
quire a  perfect  knowledge  of  the  appearances  on 
the  surface  of  humanity." 

Notwithstanding  Mrs.  Gore  touches  so  lightly 
on  the  surface  of  life,  certain  definite  socio- 
logical and  moral  principles  underlie  her  work. 
She  is  as  democratic  as  Charlotte  Smith,  Mrs. 
Inchbald,  Miss  Mitford,  or  even  William  Godwin. 
She  asserts  again  and  again  that  men  of  inferior 
birth  with  the  same  opportunities  of  education 
may  be  as  intellectual  and  refined  as  the  sons 
of  a  "hundred  earls."  Those  members  of  the 


222    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

aristocracy  who  fail  to  recognise  the  true  worth 
of  intelligent  men  of  plebeian  origin  are  made 
very  ridiculous.  In  her  novel  Pin  Money,  pub- 
lished in  183 1,  how  very  funny  is  Lady  Derenzy's 
speech  when  she  learns  that  a  soap  manu- 
facturer is  being  feted  in  fashionable  society! 
Lady  Derenzy,  by  the  way,  is  the  social  law- 
giver to  her  little  coterie : 

"It  is  now  some  years,"  said  she,  "since  the 
independence  of  America,  and  the  influence 
exerted  in  this  country  by  the  return  of  a  large 
body  of  enlightened  men,  habituated  to  the 
demoralising  spectacle  of  an  equalisation  of 
rank,  was  supposed  to  exert  a  pernicious  in- 
fluence on  the  minds  of  the  secondary  and  in- 
ferior classes  of  Great  Britain.  At  that  critical 
moment  I  whispered  to  my  husband,  'Derenzy! 
be  true  to  yourself,  and  the  world  will  be  true 
to  you.  Let  the  aristocracy  of  Great  Britain 
unite  in  support  of  the  Order;  and  it  will  main- 
tain its  ground  against  the  universe!'  Lord 
Derenzy  took  my  advice,  and  the  country  was 
saved. 

"Again,  when  the  assemblage  of  the  States 
General  of  France, — the  fatal  tocsin  of  the 
revolution, — spread  consternation  and  horror 
throughout  the  higher  ranks  of  every  European 
country,  and  the  very  name  of  the  guillotine 
operated  like  a  spell  on  the  British  peerage,  I 
whispered  to  my  husband,  'Derenzy!  be  true 


Mrs.  Gore  223 

to  yourself,  and  the  world  will  be  true  to  you. 
Let  the  aristocracy  of  Great  Britain  unite  in 
support  of  the  Order;  and  it  will  maintain  its 
ground  against  the  universe!'  Again  Lord 
Derenzy  took  my  advice,  and  again  the  country 
was  saved." 

Mrs.  Gore  has  so  cleverly  mingled  the  so-called 
self-made  men  and  men  of  inherited  rank  in 
her  books  that  one  cannot  distinguish  between 
them.  In  The  Soldier  of  Lyons,  one  of  her  early 
novels,  which  furnished  Bulwer  with  the  plot 
of  his  play  The  Lady  of  Lyons,  the  hero,  a 
peasant  by  birth  and  a  soldier  of  the  Republic, 
enters  into  a  marriage  contract  with  the  widow 
of  a  French  marquis,  in  order  to  save  her  from 
the  guillotine.  This  lady  of  high  rank  learns 
to  respect  her  husband,  and  becomes  the  suitor 
for  his  love.  In  The  Heir  of  Selwood,  a  former 
field  marshal  of  Napoleon,  a  peasant,  devotes 
his  energies  to  improving  the  condition  of  the 
poor  on  the  estate  he  had  won  by  his  services 
to  his  country,  and  at  his  death  his  tenants 
erected  a  column  to  his  memory,  bearing  the 
inscription:  "Most  dear  to  God,  to  the  king,  and 
to  the  people." 

Mrs.  Gore  constantly  asserts  that  the  only 
distinctions  between  men  are  based  upon  char- 
acter and  ability.  She  says  of  one  of  her  char- 
acters, a  poet: 

"  His  footing  in  society  is  no  longer  dependent 


224    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

upon  the  caprice  of  a  drawing-room.  It  is  the 
security  of  that  intellectual  power  which  forces 
the  world  to  bend  the  knee.  The  poor,  dreamy 
boy,  self-taught,  self-aided,  had  risen  into  power. 
He  wields  a  pen.  And  the  pen  in  our  age  weighs 
heavier  in  the  social  scale  than  a  sword  of  a 
Norman  baron." 

Mrs.  Gore  lived  at  a  time  when  the  intro- 
duction of  machinery  and  the  establishment 
of  large  factories  was  producing  a  new  type 
of  man:  men  like  Burtonshaw  in  The  Hamiltons: 
"A  practical,  matter-of-fact  individual,  with 
plenty  of  money  and  plenty  of  intellect;  the  sort 
of  human  power-loom  one  would  back  to  work 
wonders  against  a  dawdling  old  spiiming-jenny 
like  Lord  Tottenham." 

A  critic  in  the  Westminster  Review  wrote  in 
1832  as  follows: 

"The  wealthy  merchant  or  money-dealer  is 
represented,  perhaps  for  the  first  time  in  fiction, 
as  a  man  of  true  dignity,  self-respect,  education, 
and  thorough  integrity,  agreeable  in  manners, 
refined  in  tastes,  and  content  with,  if  not  proud 
of,  his  position  in  society." 

Mrs.  Gore  was  called  by  her  contemporaries 
the  novelist  of  the  new  era. 

She  was  also  interested  in  the  great  ethical 
questions  of  life.  She  did  not  write  of  the 
love  of  youthful  heroes  and  more  youthful 
heroines.  She  often  traced  the  consequences 


Mrs.  Gore  225 

of  sin  on  character  and  destiny.  In  The  Heir 
of  Selwood,  she  is  as  stern  a  moralist  in  tracing 
the  effects  of  vice  as  George  Eliot.  The  Banker's 
Wife,  the  scene  of  which  is  laid  among  the  mer- 
chants of  London,  is  a  serious  study  of  the  sor- 
rows of  a  life  devoted  to  outward  show.  The 
picture  of  the  banker  among  his  guests,  whose 
wealth,  unknown  to  them,  he  has  squandered, 
reminds  one  of  the  days  before  the  final  over- 
throw of  Dombey  and  Son. 

Mrs.  Gore  was  a  woman  of  genius.  With  the 
stern  principles  of  the  puritan,  and  feelings  as 
republican  as  the  mountain-born  Swiss,  she  was 
never  controversial.  She  saw  the  absurdities 
of  certain  hollow  pretensions  of  society,  but  her 
good-humoured  raillery  offended  no  one.  If  her 
two  hundred  volumes  could  be  weeded  of 
their  verbiage  by  some  devotee  of  literature, 
and  reduced  to  ten  or  fifteen,  they  would  be  not 
only  entertaining  reading,  but  would  throw 
strong  lights  upon  the  elite  of  London  in  the  days 
when  hair-oils,  pomades,  and  strong  perfumes 
were  the  distinguishing  marks  of  the  Quality. 

Mrs.  Gore  owed  her  place  in  English  letters 
to  native  wit  and  ability;  Mrs.  Bray  owed  hers 
to  hard  study  and  painstaking  endeavour.  She 
was  one  of  the  few  women  who  followed  the 
style  of  writing  brought  to  perfection  by  Sir 
Walter  Scott, 


226    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Mrs.  Bray  became  imbued  with  the  historic 
spirit  early  in  life.  Her  first  husband  was 
Charles  Stothard,  the  author  of  Monumental 
Effigies  of  Great  Britain,  with  whom  she  trav- 
elled through  Brittany,  Normandy  and  Flanders. 
While  he  made  careful  drawings  of  the  ruins 
of  castles  and  abbeys,  she  read  Froissart's 
Chronicles,  visited  the  places  which  he  has 
described,  and  traced  out  among  the  people  any 
surviving  customs  which  he  has  recorded. 

Two  novels  were  the  result  of  these  studies. 
De  Foix,  or  Sketclies  of  the  Manners  and  Customs 
of  the  Fourteenth  Century,  is  a  story  of  Gaston 
Phoebus,  Count  de  Foix,  whose  court  Froissart 
visited,  and  of  whom  he  wrote:  "To  speak 
briefly  and  truly,  the  Count  de  Foix  was  perfect 
in  person  and  in  mind;  and  no  contemporary 
prince  could  be  compared  with  him  for  sense, 
honour,  or  liberality. ' '  The  White  Hoods,  a  name 
by  which  the  citizens  of  Ghent  were  denomi- 
nated, is  laid  in  the  Netherlands,  and  tells  of 
the  conflict  between  the  court  and  the  citizens 
of  Ghent,  under  Philip  von  Artaveld,  during 
the  reign  of  Charles  the  Fifth  of  France  and  the 
early  kingship  of  Charles  the  Sixth.  As  in  all 
her  novels,  the  accuracy  for  which  she  strove 
in  the  most  minute  details  retards  the  action 
of  the  plot,  but  adds  to  the  historical  value  of 
these  romances. 

For  the  tragic  romance  of  The  Talba,  or  Moor 


Mrs.  Bray  227 

of  Portugal,  Mrs.  Bray,  as  she  had  not  visited 
the  Spanish  peninsula,  depended  upon  her  read- 
ing. The  plot  was  suggested  to  her  by  a  picture 
of  Ines  de  Castro  in  the  Royal  Academy.  It 
represented  the  gruesome  coronation  of  the 
corpse  of  Ines  de  Castro,  six  years  after  her 
death.  Thus  did  her  husband,  Don  Pedro, 
show  honour  to  his  wife,  who  had  been  put  to 
death  while  he,  then  a  prince,  was  serving  in  the 
army  of  Portugal.  The  whole  story  is  a  fitting 
theme  for  tragedy,  and  was  at  one  time  drama- 
tised by  Mary  Mitford.  In  order  to  give  her 
mind  the  proper  elevation  for  the  impassioned 
scenes  of  this  novel,  it  was  Mrs.  Bray's  custom 
to  read  a  chapter  of  Isaiah  or  Job  each  day 
before  beginning  to  write. 

After  the  death  of  her  first  husband,  Mrs. 
Bray  married  the  vicar  of  Tavistock,  and  for 
thirty-five  years  lived  in  the  vicarage  of  that 
town.  Here  she  became  interested  in  the 
legends  of  Devon  and  Cornwall,  and  wrote  five 
novels  founded  upon  the  history  or  tradition 
of  those  counties.  Henry  de  Pomeroy  opens 
at  the  abbey  of  Tavistock,  one  of  the  oldest 
abbeys  in  England,  during  the  reign  of  Richard 
Coeur-de-Leon.  The  scene  of  Fitz  of  Fitz-Ford  is 
also  laid  at  Tavistock,  but  during  the  reign  of 
Queen  Elizabeth.  Another  story  of  the  reign  of 
the  Virgin  Queen  was  Warleigh,  or  the  Fatal  Oak: 
a  Legend  of  Devon.  Courtenay  of  Walreddon:  a 


228    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Romance  of  tlie  West  takes  place  in  the  reign  of 
Charles  the  First,  about  the  commencement 
of  the  Civil  War.  A  gypsy  girl,  by  name  Cin- 
derella Small,  is  introduced  into  the  story,  and 
has  been  highly  praised.  The  character,  as  well 
as  some  of  the  stories  told  of  her,  was  drawn 
from  life. 

But  the  most  famous  of  these  novels  is  T re- 
lawny  of  Trelawne;  or  the  Prophecy:  a  Legend 
of  Cornwall,  a  story  of  the  rebellion  of  Mon- 
mouth.  Like  most  of  the  romances  upon  Eng- 
lish themes,  the  private  history  of  the  family 
furnishes  the  romance,  the  historical  happenings 
being  used  only  for  the  setting :  the  usual  method 
of  Scott.  The  hero  of  this  novel  is  Sir  Jonathan 
Trelawny,  one  of  the  seven  bishops  who  were 
committed  to  the  Tower  by  James  the  Second. 
When  he  was  arrested  by  the  king's  command, 
the  Cornish  men  rose  one  and  all,  and  marched 
as  far  as  Exeter,  in  their  way  to  extort  his 
liberation.  Trelawny  is  a  popular  hero  of  Corn- 
wall, as  the  following  lines  testify: 

A  good  sword  and  a  trusty  hand! 
A  merry  heart  and  true! 
King  James's  men  shall  understand 
What  Cornish  lads  can  do! 

And  have  they  fixed  the  where  and  when  ? 
And  shall  Trelawny  die? 
Here  's  twenty  thousand  Cornish  men 
Will  know  the  reason  why! 


Mrs,  Bray  229 

Out  spake  their  captain  brave  and  bold, 
A  merry  wight  was  he — 
"If  London  Tower  were  Michael's  hold, 
We  '11  set  Trelawny  free!" 


We  '11  cross  the  Tamar,  land  to  land, 
The  Severn  is  no  stay, 
All  side  to  side,  and  hand  to  hand, 
.     And  who  shall  say  us  nay? 

And  when  we  come  to  London  Wall, 

A  pleasant  sight  to  view, 

Come  forth!     Come  forth!     Ye  cowards  all, 

To  better  men  than  you! 

Trelawny  he  's  in  keep  and  hold — 
Trelawny  he  may  die, 
But  here  's  twenty  thousand  Cornish  bold 
Will  know  the  reason  why! 

Like  Scott,  Mrs.  Bray  went  about  with  note- 
book in  hand,  and  noted  the  features  of  the 
landscape,  the  details  of  a  ruin,  or  the  furniture 
or  armour  of  the  period  of  which  she  was  writing. 
It  is  this  painstaking  work,  together  with  the 
fact  that  she  had  access  to  places  and  books 
that  were  then  denied  to  the  ordinary  reader, 
and  chose  subjects  and  places  not  before  treated 
in  fiction,  that  gives  permanent  value  to  her 
writings.  She  also  had  the  proper  feeling  for 
the  past,  and  dignity  and  elevation  of  style. 
Sometimes  an  entire  page  of  her  romances 


230    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

might  be  attributed  to  the  pen  of  the  "Mighty 
Wizard. ' '  Perhaps  the  highest  compliment 
that  can  be  paid  her  as  an  artist  is  that  she 
resembles  Scott  when  he  is  nodding. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

Julia  Pardoe.     Mrs.  Trollope. 
Harriet  Martineau 

OOMEWHERE  between  the  second  and  third 
O  decades  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the 
modern  novel  was  born.  The  romances  of 
the  twenties  are,  for  the  most  part,  old-fashioned 
in  tone,  and  speak  of  an  earlier  age;  but  in  the 
thirties,  the  modern  novel,  with  its  exact  repro- 
duction of  places,  customs,  and  speech,  and 
strong  local  flavour,  was  full-grown.  Dickens, 
under  the  name  of  Boz,  was  contributing  his 
sketches  to  The  Old  Monthly  Magazine  and  the 
Evening  Chronicle.  Thackeray  was  beginning 
to  contribute  articles  to  Fraser's  Magazine, 
established  in  1830.  Annuals  and  monthlies 
sprang  up  in  the  night,  and  paid  large  sums 
for  long  and  short  stories.  The  thirst  for  them 
was  unquenchable.  Many  women  were  sup- 
porting themselves  by  writing  tales  which  did 
not  live  beyond  the  year  of  their  publication. 
Mrs.  Marsh  was  writing  stories  of  fashionable 
231 


232    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

life  varied  by  historical  romances.  Mrs.  Crowe 
wrote  stories  of  fashionable  life  varied  by  super- 
natural romances  and  tales  of  adventure.  In 
The  Story  of  Lilly  Dawson,  published  in  1847, 
the  heroine  was  captured  and  brought  up  by 
smugglers,  and  the  gradual  development  of  her 
character  was  traced ;  thus  giving  to  the  story  a 
psychological  interest.  Lady  Blessington  earned 
two  thousand  pounds  a  year  for  twenty  years  by 
novels  and  short  stories  of  fashionable  life. 
Lady  Blessington  had  a  European  reputation 
as  a  court  beauty  and  a  brilliant  and  witty 
conversationalist.  This  with  the  coronet  must 
have  helped  to  sell  her  books.  They  do  not 
contain  even  a  sentence  that  holds  the  attention. 
A  friend  said  of  her,  "Her  genius  lay  in  her 
tongue;  her  pen  paralysed  it."  More  enduring 
work  in  fiction  was  done  by  Julia  Pardoe,  Mrs. 
Trollope,  and  Harriet  Martineau. 

The  novels  of  Julia  Pardoe,  like  those  of  Mrs. 
Bray,  owe  their  value,  not  to  their  intrinsic 
merit,  but  to  the  comparatively  unknown  places 
to  which  she  introduces  her  readers.  She  ac- 
companied her  father,  Major  Pardoe,  to  Con- 
stantinople, where  they  were  entertained  by 
natives  of  high  position,  to  whom  they  had 
letters  of  introduction,  and  Miss  Pardoe  was 
the  guest  of  their  wives  in  the  harem.  Her 
knowledge  of  the  mode  of  life  and  habits  of 


Julia  Pardoe  233 

thought  of  Turkish  women  is  considered  second 
only  to  that  of  Mary  Wortley  Montagu. 

The  material  for  her  story  The  Romance  of 
the  Harem  was  obtained  during  her  visits  to 
these  Turkish  ladies.  In  this  she  has  caught 
the  languid,  heavily  perfumed  atmosphere  of 
the  Orient.  Besides  the  main  plot,  stories  of 
adventure  and  love  are  related  which  beguiled 
the  slowly  passing  hours  of  the  inmates  of  the 
seraglio.  Some  of  them  might  have  been  told 
by  Schehezerhade,  if  she  had  wished  to  add  to 
her  entertainment  of  The  Thousand  and  One 
Nights. 

After  Miss  Pardoe's  return  to  England,  she 
wrote  a  series  of  fashionable  novels,  inferior 
to  many  of  those  of  Mrs.  Gore,  and  better  than 
the  best  of  those  by  Lady  Blessington.  Con- 
fessions of  a  Pretty  Woman,  The  Jealous  Wife, 
and  The  Rival  Beauties  were  the  most  popular 
of  these,  although  they  have  long  since  been 
forgotten. 

In  1849,  Miss  Pardoe  published  a  collection 
of  stories  under  the  title  Flies  in  Amber.  The 
title,  she  explains  in  the  preface,  was  suggested 
by  a  belief  of  the  Orientals  that  amber  comes 
from  the  sea,  and  attiacts  about  it  all  insects, 
which  find  in  it  both  a  prison  and  a  posthumous 
existence.  Some  of  the  stories  of  this  col- 
lection were  gathered  in  her  travels.  An 
Adventure  in  Bithynia,  The  Magyar  and  the 


234    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Moslem,  or  an  Hungarian  Legend,  and  the  Yer"e- 
Batan-Serai,  which  means  Swallowed-up  Palace, 
the  great  subterranean  ruin  of  Constantinople, 
have  the  interest  which  always  attaches  to  tales 
gathered  by  travellers  in  unfrequented  places. 

Mrs.  Frances  Trollope,  the  mother  of  the  more 
famous  author  Anthony  Trollope,  like  Miss 
Pardoe,  found  material  for  stories  in  unfamiliar 
places.  Mrs.  Trollope  had  the  nature  of  the 
pioneer.  With  her  family,  she  sought  our 
western  lands  of  the  Mississippi  Valley,  where 
the  virgin  forest  had  resounded  to  the  axe  of 
the  first  settler  but  a  short  time  before.  She 
wrote  the  first  book  of  any  note  describing  the 
manners  of  the  Americans;  the  first  strong 
novel  calling  attention  to  the  evils  of  slavery 
in  our  Southern  States;  and  the  first  one  de- 
scribing graphically  the  white  slavery  in  the 
cotton-mills  of  Lancashire;  and  she  is,  perhaps, 
the  only  writer  who  began  a  long  literary  career 
at  the  age  of  fifty-two. 

On  the  fourth  of  November,  1827,  Mrs.  Trol- 
lope with  her  three  children  sailed  from  London, 
and,  after  about  seven  weeks  on  the  sea,  arrived 
on  Christmas  Day  at  the  mouth  of  the  Missis- 
sippi. After  a  brief  visit  in  New  Orleans,  this 
party  of  English  travellers  sailed  up  the  river 
to  Memphis,  where,  remote  from  the  comforts 
of  civilisation,  they  abode  for  a  time  under  the 


Mrs.  Trollope  235 

direction  of  Mrs.  Wright,  an  English  lecturer 
who  had  come  to  America  for  the  avowed 
purpose  of  proving  the  perfect  equality  of  the 
black  and  white  races.  But  Mrs.  Trollope  and 
her  family  soon  tired  of  life  in  the  wilderness, 
and  sought  Cincinnati,  at  that  time  a  small  city 
of  wooden  houses,  not  over  thirty  years  of  age. 
After  two  years'  residence  in  Cincinnati,  she 
went  by  stage  to  Baltimore,  visited  Philadelphia 
and  New  York,  and  returned  to  England,  after 
a  sojourn  of  three  and  a  half  years  in  this 
country. 

During  her  residence  in  the  United  States, 
she  made  copious  notes  of  what  she  saw  and 
heard.  These  she  published  the  year  after  her 
return  to  England,  under  the  title  Domestic 
Manners  of  the  Americans.  At  once  the  pens 
of  all  the  critics  were  let  loose  upon  the  author. 
Her  American  critics  declared  that  she  knew 
nothing  about  them  or  their  country;  and  their 
English  friends  refused  to  believe  that  the  people 
of  America  had  such  shocking  bad  manners. 

Mrs.  Trollope  reported  truthfully  what  she  saw 
and  heard.  But  a  frontier  city  is  made  up  of 
people  gathered  from  the  four  corners  of  the 
earth:  each  family  is  a  law  unto  itself;  so  that 
the  speeches  Mrs.  Trollope  carefully  set  down, 
and  the  customs  she  depicted,  were  often  pe- 
culiarities of  individuals  rather  than  of  a  com- 
munity. But  she  has  left  a  vivid  picture  of 


236    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

American  life  in  the  twenties,  less  exaggerated 
than  the  picture  Charles  Dickens  gave  of  it  in 
the  forties.  Mrs.  Trollope's  attitude  is  no  more 
hostile  than  his,  but  he  is  more  entertaining. 
He  held  us  up  to  ridicule  and  laughed  at  us; 
she  seriously  pointed  out  our  errors  in  the  hope 
that  we  might  amend.  She  is  slightly  incon- 
sistent at  times,  for,  while  asserting  the  equality 
of  whites  and  blacks,  she  as  bitterly  resented 
the  equality  of  white  master  and  white  servant. 
Her  purpose  in  writing  this  book  was  to  warn 
her  own  countrymen  of  the  evils  which  must 
follow  a  government  of  the  many. 

Although  she  never  takes  the  broad  view, 
but  always  the  narrow  and  partial  one,  her  book 
gives  a  good  picture  of  the  everyday  life  and 
habits  of  thought  of  the  next  generation  to  that 
which  had  fought  and  won  the  American  Revolu- 
tion. The  white  heat  of  republican  fervour, 
so  obnoxious  to  a  European,  welded  the  nation 
together  as  one  people,  and  filled  their  hearts 
with  a  religious  reverence  for  the  constitution. 
She  meant  them  as  a  reproach,  but  we  read 
these  words  with  pride:  "I  never  heard  from 
anyone  a  single  disparaging  word  against  their 
government." 

Mrs.  Trollope  has  been  described  by  her 
friends  as  a  refined  woman  of  charming  per- 
sonality. But  as  soon  as  she  began  to  write, 
she  donned  her  armour  and  proclaimed  her  hos- 


Mrs,  Trollope  237 

tility  either  to  her  hero  or  to  the  larger  part  of 
the  characters  of  the  book.  This  method  is 
dangerous  to  art.  Even  the  genius  of  Thackeray 
is  lessened  by  his  lack  of  sympathy. 

In  1833  Mrs.  Trollope  published  her  first 
novel,  The  Refugee  in  America.  It  is  the  story 
of  an  English  lord  who  has  fled  to  America  to 
escape  English  justice.  He  and  his  friends 
have  settled  in  Rochester,  New  York.  It  was 
written  for  the  sole  purpose  of  describing  the 
manners  of  the  people  of  our  Eastern  cities. 
The  author's  attitude  toward  them  is  well 
illustrated  by  a  conversation  between  Caroline, 
the  young  English  girl,  and  her  American 
protegee,  Emily.  After  a  dinner  in  Washington, 
Caroline  exclaims  to  her  friend : 

"  'Oh,  my  own  Emily,  you  must  not  live  and 
die  where  such  things  be.' 

"Emily  sighed  as  she  answered,  'I  am  born 
to  it,  Miss  Gordon. ' 

"  'But  hardly  bred  to  it.  We  have  caught 
you  young,  and  we  have  spoiled  you  for  ever 
as  an  American  lady. '  " 

Three  years  later  Mrs.  Trollope  published  her 
strongest  novel,  The  Life  and  Adventures  of  Jona- 
than Jefferson  Whitlaw.  This  is  a  powerful  pic- 
ture of  early  life  on  the  Mississippi;  it  was  the 
first  novel  since  Mrs.  Behn's  Oroonoko  which 
called  attention  to  the  evils  of  African  slavery. 
It  is  marred,  however,  by  want  of  sympathy 


238    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

with  the  community  she  is  describing.  Mr.  Jon- 
athan Whitlaw  Senior  has  "squat  in  the  bush," 
an  expression  to  which  Mrs.  Trollope  objects, 
but  which  brings  to  mind  at  once  the  log  cabin 
in  the  forest  clearing,  and  the  muscular,  un- 
couth pioneer.  Jonathan  furnishes  firewood 
to  the  Mississippi  steamers,  and  by  this  means 
gains  sufficient  wealth  to  carry  out  his  life's 
ambition:  to  set  up  a  store  in  Natchez,  and 
to  own  "niggers."  But  the  life  of  a  pioneer 
has  made  Jonathan  as  cunning  as  a  fox.  This 
cunning  his  son  Jonathan,  the  hero  of  the  story, 
has  inherited  to  the  full.  As  a  slave-owner  he 
is  as  grasping  and  cruel  as  Legree,  whom  Mrs. 
Stowe  immortalised  some  years  later.  His 
character,  though  drawn  with  strength  and 
vigour,  is  inconsistent.  He  is  a  miser,  yet  he  is 
a  gambler  and  a  spendthrift,  qualities  not  often 
found  together.  He  is  not  a  true  representa- 
tive of  the  son  of  a  pioneer.  Clio  Whitlaw,  the 
aunt  of  the  hero,  belongs  more  truly  to  her  en- 
vironment. One  suspects  the  English  family  at 
Cincinnati  had  received  neighbourly  kindnesses 
from  women  like  her.  With  her  physical 
strength  and  great  courage  she  is  kind  and 
neighbourly  to  all  who  need  her  help.  The  sad 
story  of  Edward  Bligh,  the  young  Kentuckian 
who  preached  the  gospel  to  the  slaves,  the  vic- 
tim of  lynch  law,  a  word  dreaded  even  then,  is 
as  thrilling  as  parts  of  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin. 


Mrs.  Trollope  239 

Besides  Jonathan  Jefferson  Whitlow,  Mrs. 
Trollope  created  two  other  characters  that  will 
cause  her  name  to  live  as  long  as  those  of 
William  Harrison  Ainsworth  or  G.  P.  R.  James. 
The  coarse  scheming  widow  Barnaby  is  the 
heroine  of  three  novels,  Widow  Barnaby,  The 
Widow  Married,  and  The  Widow  Wedded,  or 
the  Barndbys  in  America.  In  the  last  book  Mrs. 
Trollope  somewhat  humorously  pays  off  her 
scores  against  her  American  critics,  who  had 
dubbed  her  a  cockney,  unfamiliar  with  good  soci- 
ety in  either  England  or  America.  The  Widow 
Barnaby,  who  has  come  to  New  Orleans  with  her 
husband  after  his  little  gambling  ways  have  made 
residence  in  London  unpleasant,  decides  to  earn 
some  money  by  writing  a  book  on  America. 
She  describes  the  Americans,  not  as  they  are, 
but  as  they  think  they  are.  She  listens  to  all 
their  boasts  about  themselves  and  country, 
and  puts  it  faithfully  in  her  book.  Of  course 
they  like  it  and  she  becomes  the  literary  lion 
of  America. 

Anthony  Trollope,  in  his  book  An  Autobiog- 
raphy, said  of  his  mother's  books  on  America: 
"  Her  volumes  were  very  bitter;  but  they  were 
very  clever,  and  they  saved  the  family  from 
ruin."  She  is  also  given  the  credit  of  having 
improved  the  manners  of  American  society. 
Whenever  a  "  gentleman"  at  his  club  put  his 
feet  on  the  table,  or  indulged  in  any  liberty  of 


240    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

which  she  would  not  have  approved,  others 
cried,  "Trollope!  Trollope!  Trollope!" 

The  Vicar  of  Wrexhill,  the  scene  of  which  is 
laid  in  England,  is  an  attack  on  the  evangelical 
clergy  in  the  Episcopal  Church.  The  vicar 
is  no  truer  to  the  great  body  of  evangelical 
preachers  than  Jonathan  Jefferson  Whitlaw  is 
true  to  the  great  body  of  slave-owners.  There 
is  the  same  exaggeration  to  prove  a  theory. 
Evangelical  preaching  is  harmful,  is  the  theorem, 
and  a  man  is  selected  to  prove  it  who  in  any 
walk  of  life  would  be  a  hypocrite  and  libertine. 
The  book  has  many  interesting  situations. 
The  vicar's  proposal  to  the  rich  widow,  one  of 
his  parishioners,  is  clever:  "Let  me  henceforth 
be  as  the  shield  and  buckler  that  shall  guard 
thee;  so  that  thou  shalt  not  be  afraid  for  any 
terror  by  night,  nor  for  the  arrow  that  flieth 
by  day."  And  he  promises,  if  she  will  marry 
him,  to  lead  her  "sinful  children  into  the  life 
everlasting. "  No  other  book  has  shown,  as 
this  does,  the  powerful  effect  upon  sensitive 
natures  of  this  kind  of  preaching.  One  feels 
that  the  followers  of  the  Reverend  Vicar  were 
under  the  influence  of  hypnotic  suggestion,  and 
that  their  awakening  from  this  spell  was  like  the 
awakening  from  a  trance. 

Mrs.  Trollope  was  actuated  by  humanitarian 
motives.  This  was  not  as  usual  then  as  since 
Dickens  popularised  the  humanitarian  novel. 


Mrs.  Trollope  241 

Only  three  years  after  he  wrote  Sketches  by 
Boz,  Mrs.  Trollope  wrote  The  Life  and  Adven- 
tures of  Michael  Armstrong,  the  story  of  a  boy 
employed  in  the  mills  of  Lancashire.  Negro 
slavery  in  the  South,  even  as  Mrs.  Trollope  saw 
it,  was  a  happy  state  of  existence  compared 
with  child  slavery  in  the  mills  of  Ashleigh  and 
Deep  Valley,  Lancashire,  where  the  children 
were  driven  to  work  by  the  lash  in  the  morning, 
and  were  crippled  by  the  "Billy  roller,"  the 
name  of  the  stick  by  which  they  were  beaten 
for  inattention  to  their  work  during  the  day. 
If  the  truth  of  these  horrors  were  not  attested 
by  other  writers  of  this  time,  one  would  doubt 
the  possibility  of  their  existence  in  the  same 
land  and  at  the  same  time  in  which  Wordsworth 
was  writing  of  the  beauties  of  his  own  childhood, 
where  the  river  Derwent  mingled  its  murmurs 
with  his  nurse's  song. 

Mrs.  Trollope  assailed  injustice  with  a  pow- 
erful pen.  Woman's  moral  nature  is  truer 
and  more  sensitive  than  man's.  Even  if  her 
sympathies  cloud  her  judgment,  it  is  better  than 
that  her  judgment  should  reason  away  her 
sympathies.  Neither  has  woman  in  her  philan- 
thropy contented  herself  with  broad  principles 
which  would  help  all  and  therefore  reach  none. 
The  dusky  slave  in  the  cotton-fields,  the  pale- 
faced  child  in  the  cotton-mills,  have  alike 
touched  the  hearts  of  women,  who  by  their  pens 


242    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

have  been  able  to  awaken  the  conscience  of  a 
nation.  The  horror  of  child  labour  wrung  from 
Mrs.  Browning  the  heart-felt  poem,  The  Cry 
of  the  Children.  The  four  strong  novels  pro- 
claiming the  tyranny  of  the  whites  over  the 
blacks,  Oronooko,  Jonathan  Jefferson  Whitlaw, 
Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  and  The  Hour  and  the  Man, 
were  written  by  women. 

The  name  of  Harriet  Martineau  was  a  familiar 
one  in  every  household  during  the  early  years 
of  Queen  Victoria's  reign.  Like  Mrs.  Trollope 
she  was  a  woman  of  fearless  honesty.  But 
Harriet  Martineau  was  never  the  raconteur,  she 
was  first  the  educator.  She  wrote  story  after 
story  to  teach  lessons  in  political  and  social 
science.  Her  method  of  work,  as  set  forth 
in  her  autobiography,  was  peculiar,  and  the 
result  is  not  uninteresting.  In  her  Political 
Economy  Tales,  she  selected  certain  principles 
which  she  wished  to  set  forth,  and  embodied 
each  principle  in  a  character.  The  operations 
of  these  principles  furnished  the  plot  of  the  story. 
Besides  the  illustrations  of  the  principles  by  the 
characters,  the  laws  were  discussed  in  conver- 
sation, and  thus  the  lesson  was  taught.  In  the 
story  Brooke  and  Brooke  Farm,  she  made  use  of 
an  expression  which  Ruskin  almost  paraphrased : 
"The  whole  nation,  the  whole  world,  is  obliged 
to  him  who  makes  corn  grow  where  it  never  grew 


Harriet  Martineau  243 

before ;  and  yet  more  to  him  who  makes  two  ears 
ripen  where  only  one  ripened  before."  In  the 
tale  A  Manchester  Strike,  factory  life  and  the 
problems  that  face  the  working  men  are  set 
forth,  the  aim  being  to  show  that  work  and 
wages  depend  upon  the  great  laws  of  supply 
and  demand. 

Miss  Martineau  wrote  two  novels.  Deerbrook, 
in  1839,  was  modelled  on  Our  Village.  The 
village  doctor,  Mr.  Hope,  is  the  central  figure. 
Firm  in  his  convictions,  he  loses  the  favour  of 
the  leading  families,  and  through  their  influence 
he  is  deprived  of  his  practice.  A  fever,  how- 
ever, sweeps  over  the  place  and  his  former 
enemies  beg,  not  in  vain,  for  his  skilful  ser- 
vices. A  double  love  story  runs  through  the 
book.  Mrs.  Rowland,  a  scheming  woman,  is 
the  most  cleverly  drawn  of  the  characters,  and 
was  evidently  suggested  by  some  of  Miss 
Edge  worth's  fashionable  ladies. 

Harriet  Martineau  also  visited  America,  but 
some  years  later  than  Mrs.  Trollope,  when  the 
slavery  agitation  was  at  its  height.  As  she  had 
written  upon  the  evils  of  slavery  before  she  left 
England,  she  was  invited  to  attend  a  meeting 
of  the  Abolitionists  in  Boston.  She  accepted 
this  invitation,  and  expressed  there  her  ab- 
horrence of  slavery.  After  this  she  received 
letters  from  some  of  the  citizens  of  the  pro-slav- 
ery States,  threatening  her  life  if  she  entered 


244    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

their  domain.  This  naturally  threw  her  en- 
tirely with  the  Abolition  party,  and  she  wrote 
many  articles  to  help  their  cause. 

Miss  Martineau's  second  novel,  The  Hour  and 
the  Man,  grew  out  of  her  sympathy  and  belief 
in  the  coloured  race.  Toussaint  de  L'Ouverture, 
the  devoted  slave,  soldier,  liberator,  and  martyr, 
is  the  hero.  Every  scene  in  which  this  won- 
derful black  figures  is  vividly  written.  Many 
of  the  minor  incidents  are  but  slightly  sketched, 
and  many  of  the  minor  characters  elude  the 
reader's  grasp.  How  far  this  book  is  a  truthful 
portrayal  of  the  negro  cannot  be  judged  unti 
the  "race  problem"  is  surveyed  with  unpreju- 
diced eyes.  Then  and  not  until  then  will  its 
place  in  literature  be  assigned.  She  gives  the 
same  characterisation  of  this  hero  of  St.  Do- 
mingo as  does  Wendell  Phillips  in  his  wonderful 
speech  of  which  the  following  is  the  peroration : 

"But  fifty  years  hence,  when  Truth  gets  a 
hearing,  the  Muse  of  History  will  put  Phocian 
for  the  Greek,  Brutus  for  the  Roman,  Hampden 
for  England,  Fayette  for  France,  choose  Wash- 
ington as  the  bright,  consummate  flower  of  our 
earlier  civilisation,  then,  dipping  her  pen  in 
the  sunlight,  will  write  in  the  clear  blue,  above 
them  all,  the  name  of  the  soldier,  the  states- 
man, the  martyr,  TOUSSAINT  L'OUVERTURE." 

The  Hour  and  the  Man  was  published  in 
1840,  and  was  warmly  received  by  the  Aboli- 


Harriet  Martineau  245 

tionists.     William  Lloyd  Garrison,  after  read- 
ing it,  wrote  the  following  sonnet  to  the  author : 

England!  I  grant  that  thou  dost  justly  boast 

Of  splendid  geniuses  beyond  compare; 

Men  great  and  gallant, — women  good  and  fair, — 

Skilled  in  all  arts,  and  filling  every  post 

Of  learning,  science,  fame, — a  mighty  host! 

Poets  divine,  and  benefactors  rare, — 

Statesmen, — philosophers, — and  they  who  dare 

Boldly  to  explore  heaven's  vast  and  boundless  coast, 

To  one  alone  I  dedicate  this  rhyme, 

Whose  virtues  with  a  starry  lustre  glow, 

Whose  heart  is  large,  whose  spirit  is  sublime, 

The  friend  of  liberty,  of  wrong  the  Foe: 

Long  be  inscribed  upon  the  roll  of  time 

The  name,  the  worth,  the  works  of  HARRIET  MARTINEAU. 

Miss  Martineau  wrote  on  a  variety  of  sub- 
jects, and  generally  held  a  view  contrary  to  the 
accepted  one.  She  wrote  upon  mesmerism, 
positivism,  atheism,  which  she  professed,  and 
after  each  book  warriors  armed  with  pens 
sprang  up  to  assail  the  author.  But  she  had 
many  friends,  even  among  those  who  were  most 
bitter  against  her  doctrines.  One  wrote  of  her, 
"  There  is  the  fine,  honest,  solid,  North-country 
element  in  her."  R.  Brimley  Johnson  in  Eng- 
lish Prose,  edited  by  Craik  in  1896,  said  of  her 
writings : 

"  Her  gift  to  literature  was  for  her  own  genera- 
tion. She  is  the  exponent  of  the  infant  century 
in  many  branches  of  thought: — its  eager  and 


246    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

sanguine  philanthropy,  its  awakening  interest 
in  history  and  science,  its  rigid  and  prosaic 
philosophy.  But  her  genuine  humanity  and  real 
moral  earnestness  give  a  value  to  her  more  per- 
sonal utterances,  which  do  not  lose  their  charm 
with  the  lapse  of  time." 

Harriet  Martineau's  name  and  personality 
will  be  remembered  in  history  after  her  books 
have  been  forgotten. 


CHAPTER  XV 

The  Brontes 

DURING  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  English  fiction  largely  depicted 
manners  and  customs  of  different  classes  and 
different  parts  of  England.  While  Dickens, 
Thackeray,  Disraeli,  and  Mrs.  Gaskell  were  writ- 
ing realistic  novels,  romantic  fiction  found  noble 
exponents  in  the  Bronte  sisters. 

The  quiet  life  lived  by  the  Brontes  in  the 
vicarage  on  the  edge  of  the  village  of  Haworth 
in  the  West  Riding  of  Yorkshire  seems  prosaic 
to  the  casual  observer,  but  it  had  many  weird 
elements  of  romanticism.  The  purple  moors 
stretching  away  behind  the  grey  stone  vicarage, 
the  grey  sky,  and  the  sun  always  half-frowning, 
and  never  sporting  with  nature  here  as  it  does 
over  the  mountains  in  Westmoreland,  make 
thought  earnest  and  deep,  and  suggest  the 
mystery  which  surrounds  human  life.  It  is  a 
serious  country,  that  of  the  Wharf  valley;  the 
people  are  a  serious  people,  silent  and  observant. 
The  Brontes  were  a  direct  outcome  of  this 
247 


248    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

country  and  people,  only  in  them  their  sever- 
ity and  silence  were  kindled  into  life  by  a  Celtic 
imagination. 

What  a  group  of  people  lived  within  those 
grey  stone  walls!  As  the  vicar  and  his  four 
motherless  children  gathered  about  their  simple 
board,  while  they  engaged  in  conversation 
with  each  other  or  with  the  curate,  what  scenes 
would  have  been  enacted  in  that  quiet  room 
if  the  fancies  teeming  in  each  childish  brain 
could  have  been  suddenly  endowed  with  life! 
How  could  even  a  dull  curate,  with  an  under- 
current of  addition  and  subtraction  running  in 
his  brain,  based  upon  his  meagre  salary  and 
economical  expenditures,  have  been  insensible 
to  the  thought  with  which  the  very  atmosphere 
must  have  been  surcharged?  The  brother, 
Patrick  Bran  well,  found  his  audience  in  the  pub- 
lic house,  and  delighted  it  with  his  wit  and  con- 
versation. The  sisters,  after  their  household 
tasks  were  done,  wrote  their  stories  and  often 
read  them  to  each  other. 

But  fate  had  chosen  her  darkest  hues  in  which 
to  weave  the  warp  and  woof  of  their  lives.  The 
wild  dissipations  and  wilder  talk  of  their  brother 
Branwell  clouded  the  imaginations  of  his  sisters, 
and  in  a  short  time  death  was  a  constant  presence 
in  their  midst.  In  September,  1848,  Branwell 
died  at  the  age  of  thirty;  in  less  than  three 
months,  Emily  died  at  the  age  of  twenty-nine; 


Emily  Bronte  249 

and  in  five  months,  Anne  died  at  the  age  of 
twenty-seven;  and  Charlotte,  the  eldest,  was 
left  alone  with  her  father.  During  the  remain- 
ing six  years  of  her  life,  her  compensation  for  her 
loss  of  companionship  was  her  writing.  Not 
long  after  the  death  of  her  sisters,  Mr.  Nicholls 
proposed  to  her;  was  refused;  proposed  again 
and  was  accepted;  then  came  the  separation 
caused  by  Mr.  Bronte's  hostility  to  the  marriage; 
then  the  marriage  in  the  church  under  whose 
pavement  so  many  members  of  her  family  were 
buried,  grim  attendants  of  her  wedding;  then 
the  nine  short  months  of  married  life;  then  the 
death  of  the  last  of  the  Bronte  sisters  at  the 
age  of  thirty-nine.  Mr.  Bronte  outlived  her  only 
six  years,  but  he  was  the  last  of  his  family. 
Six  children  had  been  born  to  Patrick  Bronte, 
not  one  survived  him.  Forty  years  had  elimi- 
nated a  family  which  yet  lives'  through  the  im- 
aginative powers  of  the  three  daughters  who 
reached  years  of  maturity. 

Of  the  three  sisters,  the  least  is  known  of 
Emily,  and  her  one  novel,  Wuthering  Heights, 
reveals  nothing  of  herself.  Not  one  of  the 
characters  thought  or  felt  as  did  the  quiet, 
retiring  author.  Yet  so  great  was  her  dramatic 
power  that  her  brother  Bran  well  was  credited 
with  the  book,  as  it  was  deemed  impossible  for 
a  woman  to  have  conceived  the  character  of 
Heathcliff,  And  yet  this  arch-fiend  of  litera- 


250    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

ture  was  created  by  the  daughter  of  a  country 
vicar,  whose  only  journeys  from  home  had  been 
to  schools,  either  as  pupil  or  governess.  Char- 
lotte Bronte  has  thrown  but  little  light  upon 
her  sister's  character.  She  says  that  she  loved 
animals  and  the  moors,  but  was  cold  toward 
people  and  repelled  any  attempt  to  win  her 
confidence.  The  author  of  Jane  Eyre  seems 
neither  to  have  understood  Emily's  nature  nor 
her  genius.  Yet  we  are  told  that  Emily  was 
constantly  seen  with  her  arms  around  the  gentle 
Anne,  and  that  they  were  inseparable  com- 
panions. If  Anne  Bronte  could  have  lived 
longer,  she  would  have  thrown  much  light  upon 
the  character  of  the  author  of  Wuihering 
Heights.  But  now,  as  we  read  of  her  brief  life 
and  her  one  novel,  she  seems  to  belong  to  the 
great  dramatists  rather  than  to  the  novelists, 
to  the  poets  who  live  apart  from  the  world  and 
commune  only  with  the  people  of  their  own 
creating. 

Wuthering  Heights  stands  alone  in  the  history 
of  prose  fiction.  It  belongs  to  the  wild  region 
of  romanticism,  but  it  imitates  no  book,  and 
has  never  been  copied.  No  incident,  no  char- 
acter, no  description,  can  be  traced  to  the 
influence  of  any  other  book,  but  the  atmosphere 
is  that  of  the  West  Riding  of  Yorkshire. 

Charlotte  Bronte  thus  speaks  of  it  in  a  letter 
to  a  friend: 


Emily  Bronte  251 

"  Wuthering  Heights  was  hewn  in  a  wild  work- 
shop, with  simple  tools,  out  of  homely  ma- 
terials. The  statuary  found  a  granite  block 
on  a  solitary  moor ;  gazing  thereon,  he  saw  how 
from  the  crag  might  be  elicited  a  head,  savage, 
swart,  sinister:  a  form  moulded  with  at  least 
one  element  of  grandeur — power.  He  wrought 
with  a  rude  chisel,  and  from  no  model  but  the 
vision  of  his  meditations.  With  time  and  labour, 
the  crag  took  human  shape,  and  there  it  stands, 
colossal,  dark  and  frowning,  half  statue,  half 
rock,  in  the  former  sense,  terrible  and  goblin- 
like;  in  the  latter,  almost  beautiful,  for  its 
colouring  is  of  mellow  grey,  and  moorland  moss 
clothes  it,  and  heath,  with  its  blooming  bells 
and  balmy  fragrance,  grows  faithfully  close 
to  the  giant's  foot." 

All  of  this  is  true,  but  it  gives  only  the  gen- 
eral outlines,  nothing  of  the  inner  meaning. 

In  all  literature,  there  is  not  so  repulsive  a 
villain  as  Heathcliff,  the  offspring  of  the  gipsies. 
Insensible  to  kindness,  but  resentful  of  wrong; 
hard,  scheming,  indomitable  in  resolution ;  quick 
to  put  off  the  avenging  of  an  injury  until  he 
can  make  his  revenge  serve  his  purpose;  the 
personification  of  strength  and  power;  he  is 
yet  capable  of  a  love  stronger  than  his  hate. 
Heathcliff  is  so  repulsive  that  he  does  not 
attract,  and  drawn  with  such  skill  that,  as  has 
been  said,  he  has  not  been  imitated. 


252    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

But  the  strong,  dark  picture  of  Heathcliff 
makes  us  forget  that  Catharine  is  the  centre 
of  the  story.  The  night  that  Mr.  Lockwood 
spends  at  Wuthering  Heights  he  reads  her 
books,  and  her  spirit  appears  to  him  crying  for 
entrance  at  the  window,  and  complaining  that 
she  has  wandered  on  the  moors  for  twenty 
years.  While  living,  she  represents  a  human 
soul  balanced  between  heaven  and  hell,  loved 
by  both  the  powers  of  darkness  and  of  light. 
But  in  her  earliest  years,  she  had  loved  Heath- 
cliff;  their  thoughts,  their  affections  were  inter- 
twined, and  they  were  welded,  as  it  were,  into 
one  soul,  not  at  first  by  love,  but  by  their 
common  hatred  of  Hindley  Earnshaw.  When 
Catharine  meets  Edgar  Linton,  her  finer  nature 
asserts  itself.  She  loves  him  as  a  being  from 
another  world;  he  gives  her  the  first  glimpse 
of  real  goodness,  kindness,  and  gentleness.  She 
catches  through  him  a  gleam  of  Paradise.  But 
she  knows  how  transient  this  is,  and  says  to 
her  old  nurse,  Nelly  Dean: 

"I've  no  more  business  to  marry  Edgar 
Linton  than  I  have  to  be  in  heaven;  and  if  the 
wicked  man  in  there  had  not  brought  Heath- 
cliff  so  low,  I  should  n't  have  thought  of  it.  It 
would  degrade  me  to  marry  Heathcliff  now; 
and  that,  not  because  he's  handsome,  no, 
Nelly,  but  because  he  's  more  myself  than  I  am. 
Whatever  our  souls  are  made  of,  his  and  mine 


Emily  Bronte  253 

are  the  same,  and  Linton's  is  as  different  as  a 
moonbeam  from  lightning,  or  frost  from  fire." 

But  Catharine  is  married  to  Edgar,  and  for 
three  years  her  better  nature  triumphs.  Heath- 
cliff  is  away ;  Edgar  Linton  loves  her  truly,  and 
their  home  is  happy.  Catharine  alone  knows 
that  that  house  is  not  her  true  place  of  abode. 
She  alone  knows  that  Edgar  has  not  touched 
her  inner  nature.  She  knows  that  her  real  self, 
the  self  that  must  abide  through  the  centuries, 
is  indissolubly  linked  with  another's.  And  when 
Heathcliff  returns,  the  intensity  of  her  joy, 
her  almost  unearthly  delight,  she  neither  can 
nor  attempts  to  conceal.  Not  once  is  she  de- 
ceived as  to  his  true  nature.  She  knows  the 
depth  of  his  depravity,  and  thus  warns  the  girl 
who  has  fallen  in  love  with  him: 

"He's  not  a  rough  diamond — a  pearl-con- 
taining oyster  of  a  rustic; — he  's  a  fierce,  pitiless, 
wolfish  man.  I  never  say  to  him,  let  this  or 
that  enemy  alone,  because  it  would  be  un- 
generous or  cruel  to  harm  them, — I  say,  let 
them  alone,  because  I  should  hate  them  to  be 
wronged :  and  he  'd  crush  you,  like  a  sparrow's 
egg,  Isabella,  if  he  found  you  a  troublesome 
charge." 

But  Catharine's  nature  is  akin  to  his,  and  it 
is  with  almost  brutal  delight  that  she  helps 
forward  this  marriage,  when  she  finds  the  girl 
does  not  trust  her  word. 


254 


Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 


Then  comes  the  strife  between  Edgar  and 
Heathcliff  for  the  soul,  so  it  seems,  of  Catharine. 
There  is  no  jealousy  on  Edgar's  part.  The  book 
never  stoops  to  anything  so  earthly.  Edgar 
loathes  Heathcliff  and  cannot  understand  Cath- 
arine's affection  for  her  early  playmate.  Al- 
though she  never  for  a  moment  hesitates  in  her 
allegiance  to  Heathcliff,  it  is  this  strife  that 
causes  her  death.  The  strife  between  good  and 
evil  wears  her  out. 

Even  after  her  death,  her  soul  cannot  leave 
this  earth.  It  is  still  joined  to  Heathcliff's. 
It  resembles  here  the  story  of  Paola  and  Fran- 
cesca.  Catharine  is  waiting  for  him  and  his 
only  delight  is  in  her  haunting  presence.  Heath- 
cliff  cannot  be  accused  of  keeping  Catharine 
from  Paradise.  In  life  she  would  not  let  him 
from  her  presence,  and  she  clings  to  him  now. 
It  is  the  story  of  Undine  reversed.  Undine 
gained  a  soul  through  a  mortal's  love.  And 
we  feel  toward  the  close  that  Catharine,  selfish 
and  passionate  as  she  was,  is  yet  Heathcliff's 
better  spirit.  Catharine  while  living  had  pre- 
vented Heathcliff  from  killing  her  brother. 
Although  he  loved  Catharine  better  than  him- 
self, and  would  have  made  any  sacrifice  at  her 
request,  he  feels  no  more  tenderness  for  her 
offspring  than  for  his  own.  But  the  spirit  of 
Catharine  lived  in  her  child  and  nephew,  and 
when  they  looked  at  him  with  her  eyes,  he  had 


Emily  Bronte  255 

no  pleasure  in  his  revenge  upon  the  son  of 
Hindley  nor  on  the  daughter  of  Edgar  Linton. 

In  the  tenderness  that  once  or  twice  comes 
over  Heathcliff  as  he  looks  at  Hareton  Earn- 
shaw,  there  is  a  ray  of  promise  that  he  may  be 
redeemed.  And  in  the  final  outcome  of  the 
story,  one  can  but  hope  that  Catharine's  restless 
spirit,  as  it  watches  and  waits  for  Heathcliff,  is 
striving  to  bring  some  blessing  upon  her  house. 
The  awakening  of  a  better  nature  in  Hareton, 
through  his  love  for  Catharine's  daughter,  is  a 
pretty,  tender  idyl.  The  book  is  like  a  Greek 
tragedy  in  this,  that  at  the  close  the  atmosphere 
has  been  purged;  the  sun  once  more  shines 
through  the  windows  of  Wuthering  Heights; 
hatred  is  dead,  and  love  reigns  supreme. 

Wuthering  Heights  is  a  novel  not  of  externals, 
not  of  character,  but  of  something  deeper,  more 
vital.  The  love  of  Catharine  and  Heathcliff 
has  no  physical  basis;  it  is  the  union  of  souls 
evil,  but  not  material.  It  is  the  sex  of  spirit, 
not  of  body,  that  adds  its  might  to  the  resistless 
force  that  unites  these  two.  Notwithstanding 
the  external  pictures  are  so  distinct  that  a 
painter  could  transfer  them  to  his  canvas,  the 
book  is  a  soul-tragedy. 

Wuthering  Heights  cannot  be  classed  among 
the  so-called  popular  novels.  It  has  appealed 
to  the  poets  rather  than  to  the  readers  of  fiction. 
It  has  received  the  warmest  praise  from  the 


256    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

poet  Swinburne.  In  The  Athen&um  of  June 
1 6,  1883,  he  thus  eulogises  it: 

"Now  in  Wuthering  Heights  this  one  thing 
needful  ['logical  and  moral  certitude']  is  as 
perfectly  and  triumphantly  attained  as  in  King 
Lear  or  The  Duchess  of  Malfi,  in  The  Bride  of 
Lammermoor  or  Notre-Dame  de  Paris.  From 
the  first  we  breathe  the  fresh  dark  air  of  tragic 
passion  and  presage ;  and  to  the  last  the  changing 
wind  and  flying  sunlight  are  in  keeping  with 
the  stormy  promise  of  the  dawn.  There  is  no 
monotony,  there  is  no  repetition,  but  there  is  no 
discord.  This  is  the  first  and  last  necessity, 
the  foundation  of  all  labour  and  the  crown  of  all 
success,  for  a  poem  worthy  of  the  name;  and 
this  it  is  that  distinguishes  the  hand  of  Emily 
from  the  hand  of  Charlotte  Bronte.  All  the 
works  of  the  elder  sister  are  rich  in  poetic  spirit, 
poetic  feeling,  and  poetic  detail ;  but  the  younger 
sister's  work  is  essentially  and  definitely  a  poem 
in  the  fullest  and  most  positive  sense  of  the 
term." 

At  the  close  of  this  essay  he  writes: 

"It  may  be  true  that  not  many  will  ever  take 
it  to  their  hearts ;  it  is  certain  that  those  who  do 
like  it  will  like  nothing  very  much  better  in  the 
whole  world  of  poetry  or  prose." 

All  that  we  know  of  Emily  Bronte's  nature 
is  consistent,  such  as  we  would  expect  of  the 
author  of  Wuthering  Heights.  The  first  stanza 


Anne  Bronte  257 

of  her  last  poem,  written  but  a  short  time  be- 
fore her  death,  reveals  her  strength  of  will  and 
faith: 

No  coward  soul  is  mine, 

No  trembler  in  the  world's  storm-troubled  sphere: 
I  see  Heaven's  glories  shine, 

And  faith  shines  equal,  arming  me  from  fear. 

These  lines  evoked  the  following  tribute  from 
Matthew  Arnold: 

she 

(How  shall  I  sing  her  ?)  whose  soul 

Knew  no  fellow  for  might, 

Passion,  vehemence,  grief, 

Daring,  since  Byron  died, 

That  world-famed  son  of  fire — she,  who  sank 

Baffled,  unknown,  self -consumed ; 

Whose  too  bold  dying  song 

Stirr'd,  like  a  clarion-blast,  my  soul. 

The  great  books  of  prose  fiction  have  been 
for  the  most  part  the  work  of  mature  years. 
The  lyric  poets  burst  into  rhapsody  at  the  dawn 
of  life;  but  the  powers  of  the  novelist  have 
ripened  more  slowly.  The  novelists  have  done 
better  work  after  thirty-five  than  at  an  earlier 
age  but  few  of  them  have  written  a  classic  at  the 
age  of  twenty-eight,  as  did  Emily  Bronte. 

Anne  Bronte's  fame  has  been  both  augmented 
and  dimmed  by  the  greater  genius  of  her  two 
sisters,  She  is  remembered  principally  as  one 


258    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

of  the  Brontes,  so  that  her  books  have  been 
oftener  reprinted  and  more  extensively  read 
than  their  actual  merit  would  warrant.  In 
comparison  with  the  greater  genius  of  Charlotte 
and  Emily,  her  writings  have  been  declared 
void  of  interest,  and  without  any  ray  of  the 
brilliancy  which  distinguishes  their  books.  This 
latter  statement  is  not  true.  Anne  Bronte  did 
not  have  their  imaginative  power,  but  she 
reproduced  what  she  had  seen  and  learned  of 
life  with  conscientious  devotion  to  truth.  Wuth- 
ering  Heights  and  Agnes  Grey,  Anne  Bronte's 
first  book,  were  published  together  in  three 
volumes  so  as  to  meet  the  popular  demand 
that  novels,  like  the  graces,  should  appear  in 
threes.  It  is  a  photographic  representation  of 
the  life  of  a  governess  in  England  during  the 
forties.  Agnes 's  courage  in  determining  to 
augment  the  family  income  by  seeking  a  po- 
sition as  governess;  the  high  hopes  with  which 
she  enters  upon  her  first  position;  her  con- 
scientious resolve  to  do  her  full  Christian  duty 
to  the  spoiled  children  of  the  Bloomfields;  her 
dismissal  and  sad  return  home;  her  second 
position  in  the  family  of  Mr.  Murray,  a  country 
squire;  the  two  daughters,  one  determined  to 
make  a  fine  match  for  herself,  the  other  a 
perfect  hoyden  without  a  thought  beyond  the 
horses  and  dogs;  the  disregard  of  the  truth  in 
both;  Mr.  Hatfield,  the  minister,  who  cared 


Anne  Bronte  259 

only  for  the  county  families  among  his  parish- 
ioners; Miss  Murray's  marriage  for  position  and 
the  unhappiness  that  followed  it — form  a  series 
of  photographs,  which  only  a  sensitive,  respon- 
sive nature  could  have  produced.  The  contrast 
between  the  gentle,  refined  governess,  and  the 
coarse  natures  upon  whom  she  is  dependent,  is 
well  shown,  although  there  is  no  attempt  on  the 
part  of  the  author  to  assert  any  superiority  of 
one  over  the  other.  We  have  many  books  in 
which  the  shrinking  governess  is  described  from 
the  point  of  view  of  the  family  or  one  of  their 
guests,  but  here  the  governess  of  an  English 
fox-hunting  squire  has  spoken  for  herself;  she 
has  described  her  trials  and  the  constant  self- 
sacrifice  which  is  demanded  of  her  without 
bitterness,  and  in  a  kindly  spirit  withal,  and  for 
that  reason  the  book  is  a  valuable  addition  to  the 
history  of  the  life  and  manners  of  the  century. 
The  Tenant  of  Wildfell  Hall,  her  second  novel, 
was  a  peculiar  book  to  have  shaped  itself  in  the 
brain  of  the  gentle  youngest  daughter  of  the 
Vicar  of  Haworth.  But  Anne  Bronte  had  seen 
phases  of  life  which  must  have  sorely  wounded 
her  pure  spirit.  She  had  been  governess  at  Thorp 
Green,  where  her  brother  Branwell  was  tutor, 
and  where  he  formed  that  unfortunate  attach- 
ment for  the  wife  of  his  employer,  which,  with  the 
help  of  liquor  and  opium,  deranged  his  mind. 
Anne  wrote  in  her  diary  at  this  time,  "  I  have 


260    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

had  some  very  unpleasant  and  undreamt-of 
experience  of  human  nature."  As  we  picture 
Anne  Bronte,  with  her  light  brown  hair,  violet - 
blue  eyes,  shaded  by  pencilled  eyebrows,  and 
transparent  complexion,  she  seems  a  spirit  of 
goodness  and  purity  made  to  behold  daily  a 
depth  of  evil  in  the  nature  of  one  dear  to  her, 
which  fills  her  with  wonderment  and  horror. 

Mr.  Huntingdon  of  Wildfell  Hall  was  drawn 
from  personal  observation  of  her  brother.  She 
wrote  with  minuteness,  because  she  believed 
it  her  duty  to  hold  up  his  life  as  a  warning  to 
others.  The  gradual  change  in  Mr.  Huntingdon 
from  the  happy  confident  lover  to  the  ruined 
debauchee  is  well  traced;  the  story  of  his  in- 
fatuation for  the  wife  of  his  friend,  so  reckless 
that  he  attempted  no  concealment,  is  realistic 
in  the  extreme.  But  what  a  change  in  the  novel ! 
A  hundred  years  before,  Huntingdon  would 
have  made  a  fine  hero  of  romance,  but  here  he 
is  disgraced  to  the  position  of  chief  villain, 
and  the  reader  feels  for  him  only  pity  and 
loathing.  Probably  a  man's  pen  would  have 
touched  his  errors  more  lightly,  but  Anne 
Bronte  painted  him  as  he  appeared  to  her.  The 
author  attributes  such  a  character  as  Hunting- 
don's to  false  education,  and  makes  her  heroine 
say: 

"  As  for  my  son — if  I  thought  he  would  grow 
up  to  be  what  you  call  a  man  of  the  world,— one 


Charlotte  Bronte  261 

that  has  '  seen  life,'  and  glories  in  his  experience, 
even  though  he  should  so  far  profit  by  it  as  to 
sober  down,  at  length,  into  a  useful  and  re- 
spected member  of  society — I  would  rather 
that  he  died  to-morrow — rather  a  thousand 
times." 

Notwithstanding  its  defects — and  it  is  full 
of  them  judged  from  the  stand-point  of  art — 
Wildfell  Hall  is  a  book  of  promise.  In  the 
descriptions  of  the  Hall,  the  mystery  that  sur- 
rounds its  mistress,  the  rumours  of  her  unknown 
lover,  the  heathclad  hills  and  the  desolate  fields, 
there  are  romantic  elements  that  remind  one  of 
Wnthering  Heights.  The  book  is  more  faulty 
than  Agnes  Grey,  but  the  writer  had  a  deeper 
vision  of  life  with  its  weaknesses  and  its  depths  of 
human  passion.  If  years  had  mellowed  that 
"undreamt-of  experience"  of  Thorp  Green, 
Anne  Bronte  with  her  truthful  observation  and 
sympathetic  insight  into  character  might  have 
written  a  classic.  The  material  out  of  which 
Wildfell  Hall  was  wrought ,  under  a  more  mature 
mind,  with  a  better  grasp  of  the  whole  and  a 
better  regard  for  proportion,  would  have  made 
a  novel  worthy  of  a  place  beside  Jane  Eyre. 

That  English  fiction  has  produced  sweeter 
and  more  varied  fruit  by  being  grafted  with  the 
novels  of  women  no  one  who  gives  the  matter 
a  serious  thought  can  for  a  moment  doubt. 


262    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

One  distinctive  phase  of  woman's  mind  made 
its  way  but  slowly  in  the  English  novel.  Women 
are  by  nature  introspective.  They  read  char- 
acter and  are  quick  to  grasp  the  motives  and 
passions  that  underlie  action.  The  French 
women  have  again  and  again  embodied  this 
view  of  human  nature  in  their  novels,  which 
are  essentially  of  the  inner  life.  The  Princess 
of  Cleves  by  Madame  de  Lafayette,  written  in 
1678,  is  the  first  book  in  which  all  the  conflicts 
are  those  of  the  emotions ;  here  the  great  triumph 
is  that  which  a  woman  wins  over  her  own  heart. 
Madame  de  Tencin  in  Memoires  du  Comte  de 
Comminges  represents  her  hero  and  heroine 
under  the  influence  of  two  great  passions,  re- 
ligion and  love.  Madame  de  Souza,  Madame 
Cottin,  Madame  de  Genlis,  Madame  de  Stael,  and 
George  Sand  wrote  novels  of  the  inner  life. 
The  Princess  of  Cleves  with  noble  dignity  con- 
trols her  emotion  and  at  last  conquers  it.  The 
pages  of  George  Sand  thrill  with  unbridled 
passion. 

The  English  women,  however,  are  more  re- 
pressed by  nature  than  the  French,  and  the 
English  novel  of  the  inner  life  advanced  but 
slowly.  The  emotions  of  the  long-forgotten 
Sidney  Biddulph  are  minutely  told.  A  Simple 
Story  by  Mrs.  Inchbald  is  a  psychological  novel. 
Amelia  Opie,  Mary  Brunton,  and  Mrs.  Shelley 
wrote  novels  of  the  inner  life. 


Charlotte  Bronte  263 

But  Jane  Eyre  is  the  first  English  novel  which 
in  sustained  intensity  of  emotion  can  compare 
with  the  novels  of  Madame  de  Stael  or  George 
Sand.  The  style  partakes  of  the  high- wrought 
character  of  the  heroine,  and  the  reader  is 
whirled  along  in  the  vortex  of  feeling  until  he 
too  partakes  of  every  varied  mood  of  the  char- 
acters, and  closes  the  book  fevered  and  ex- 
hausted. It  is  one  of  the  ironies  of  fate  that 
Charlotte  Bronte  with  her  strong  pro- Anglican 
prejudices  should  belong  to  the  school  of  these 
French  women.  But  there  is  the  same  difference 
between  their  writings  that  there  is  between 
the  French  temperament  and  the  English.  Even 
in  the  wildest  moments  of  Jane  Eyre  her  passion 
is  rather  like  the  river  Wharf  when  it  has  over- 
flowed its  banks ;  while  theirs  is  like  the  mountain 
torrent  that  bears  all  down  before  it. 

Much  of  the  passion  that  Charlotte  Bronte 
describes  is  pure  imagination.  She  wrote  freely 
to  her  friends  about  herself  and  the  people  whom 
she  knew.  The  three  rejected  suitors  caused 
her  only  a  little  amusement.  Her  love  for  Mr. 
Nicholls,  whom  she  afterwards  married,  was 
little  warmer  than  respect.  We  could  as  easily 
weave  a  romance  out  of  Jane  Austen's  remark 
that  the  poet  Crabbe  was  a  man  whom  she  could 
marry  as  to  make  a  love  story  out  of  Charlotte's 
relations  to  Monseiur  He"ger,  who  figures  as  the 
hero  in  three  of  her  books.  Here  she  is  greater 


264   Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

than  the  French  women  writers:  they  knew  by 
experience  what  they  wrote;  she  by  innate 
genius. 

Perhaps  no  novelist  ever  had  more  meagre 
materials  out  of  which  to  make  four  novels  than 
had  Charlotte  Bronte:  her  sisters,  Monsieur  and 
Madame  Heger,  the  curates,  and  herself;  a  small 
village  in  Yorkshire,  two  boarding  schools,  two 
positions  as  governess,  and  a  short  time  spent 
in  a  school  in  Brussels.  Compare  this  range 
with  the  material  that  Scott,  Dickens,  or 
Thackeray  had — then  judge  how  much  of  the 
elixir  of  genius  was  given  to  each. 

The  early  pages  of  Jane  Eyre,  the  first  novel 
which  Charlotte  Bronte  published,  describe 
Lowood  Institution,  a  place  modelled  upon 
Cowan's  Bridge  School.  The  two  teachers,  the 
kind  Miss  Temple  and  the  cruel  Miss  Scatcherd, 
were  drawn  from  two  instructors  there  at  the 
time  the  Brontes  attended  it.  Helen  Burns, 
so  untidy  but  so  meek  in  spirit,  was  Maria 
Bronte,  the  eldest  sister,  who  died  at  the  age 
of  eleven,  probably  as  a  result  of  the  poor  food 
and  harsh  treatment  of  the  school.  With  what 
calm  she  replies  to  Jane,  when  she  would  sym- 
pathise with  her  for  an  unjust  punishment: 

"I  am,  as  Miss  Scatcherd  said,  slatternly;  I 
seldom  put,  and  never  keep,  things  in  order; 
I  am  careless;  I  forget  rules;  I  read  when  I 
should  learn  my  lessons ;  I  have  no  method ;  and 


Charlotte  Bronte  265 

sometimes  I  say,  like  you,  I  cannot  bear  to  be 
subjected  to  systematic  arrangements.  This 
is  all  very  provoking  to  Miss  Scatcherd,  who  is 
naturally  neat,  punctual,  and  particular." 

Helen  Burns,  with  her  calm  submission,  and 
Jane  Eyre,  with  her  rebellious  spirit,  are  finely 
contrasted.  Jane's  passionate  resentment  of  the 
punishments  which  Miss  Scatcherd  inflicted  on 
Helen  was  genuine.  Charlotte  was  nine  years 
old  when  she  left  Cowan's  Bridge  School,  but 
her  suppressed  anger  at  the  punishments  which 
her  sister  Maria  had  received  there  flashed  out 
years  afterwards  in  Jane  Eyre. 

Charlotte  Bronte  was  writing  Jane  Eyre  at 
the  same  time  that  Emily  and  Anne  were  writing 
Wuthering  Heights  and  Agnes  Grey.  As  they 
read  from  their  manuscripts,  Charlotte  objected 
to  beauty  as  a  requisite  of  a  heroine,  and  said, 
"  I  will  show  you  a  heroine  as  plain  and  as  small 
as  myself,  who  shall  be  as  interesting  as  any 
of  yours."  So  arose  the  conception  of  Jane 
Eyre.  If  the  slight,  shy,  Yorkshire  governess, 
without  beauty  or  charm  of  manner,  had  ap- 
peared before  the  imagination  of  any  novelist 
either  male  or  female,  at  that  time,  and  asked 
to  be  admitted  into  the  house  of  fiction,  she 
would  have  been  refused  entrance  as  cruelly  as 
Hannah  shut  the  door  in  the  face  of  Jane  Eyre, 
when  she  came  to  her  dripping  with  the  rain, 
cold  and  weak  from  two  nights'  exposure  on  the 


266    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

moor,  and  asking  for  charity.  But  Charlotte 
Bronte,  with  a  woman's  sympathetic  eye  made 
doubly  penetrating  and  loving  by  genius,  chose 
this  outcast  from  romance  as  a  heroine,  a  woman 
without  beauty  or  charm,  and  boldly  proclaimed 
that  moral  beauty  was  superior  to  physical 
beauty,  and  that  the  attraction  of  one  soul  for 
another  lay  quite  beyond  the  pale  of  external 
form. 

Jane  Eyre  is  not,  however,  Charlotte  Bronte, 
as  has  been  so  often  asserted.  She  would  not 
have  gone  back  to  comfort  Mr.  Rochester,  after 
she  had  once  left  the  Hall.  One  suspects  that 
he  was  drawn  from  reading,  since  the  author 
hardly  trusted  her  knowledge  of  worldly  men 
to  draw  a  fitting  lover  for  Jane.  Mr.  Rochester 
is  very  much  the  same  type  of  man  as  Mr.  B., 
whom  Pamela  married,  and  the  independent 
Jane  addresses  him  as  "My  Master,"  an  ex- 
pression constantly  on  the  lips  of  Pamela.  Yet 
Rochester  leaves  a  permanent  impression  on  the 
mind,  for  he  represents  a  strong  man  at  war 
with  destiny.  He  conceals  his  marriage  because 
of  his  determination  to  conquer  fate.  It  is 
pointed  out  by  critics  to-day  that  he  is  quite  an 
impossible  character,  that  he  is,  in  fact,  a 
woman's  hero.  It  is  well  to  remember,  how- 
ever, that  the  author  of  Jane  Eyre  was  believed 
at  first  to  have  been  a  man,  as  it  was  thought 
impossible  for  a  man  like  Rochester  to  have 


Charlotte  Bronte  267 

been  conceived  in  a  woman's  brain,  and  not 
until  Mrs.  Gaskell's  life  of  the  Brontes  was 
published  was  Charlotte's  character  as  a  modest 
woman  established.  But  men  have  repudiated 
Mr.  Rochester,  and  so  we  must  accept  their 
judgment. 

The  heroine  of  her  next  novel,  Shirley,  was 
suggested  by  Emily  Bronte.  Only  Shirley  was 
not  Emily.  Shirley  could  not  have  conceived 
even  the  dim  outlines  of  Wuthering  Heights,  but 
she  had  many  of  the  strong  qualities  of  Emily, 
and  these,  mingled  with  the  softer  stuff  of  her 
own  nature,  make  her  contradictory  but  charm- 
ing, and  Louis  Moore,  an  agreeable  tutor  whom 
Emily  Bronte  would  have  quite  despised, 
naturally  falls  in  love  with  his  wayward  pupil, 
as  they  pore  over  books  in  the  school-room. 
Shirley  is  contrasted  with  Caroline  Helstone, 
of  whom  Mrs.  Humphry  Ward  says:  "For 
delicacy,  poetry,  divination,  charm,  Caroline 
stands  supreme  among  the  women  of  Miss 
Bronte's  gallery."  Even  if  other  admirers  of 
Miss  Bronte  deny  her  this  eminence,  she  cer- 
tainly possesses  all  the  qualities,  rare  among 
heroines,  which  Mrs.  Ward  has  attributed  to  her. 

In  many  of  the  conversations  between  Shirley 
and  Caroline,  there  are  reminders  of  what  passed 
between  the  Bronte  sisters  in  their  own  home. 
The  relative  excellence  of  men  and  women 
novelists  always  interested  them.  Shirley 


268    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

evidently  expressed  Charlotte's  own  views  in 
the  following  words: 

"If  men  could  see  us  as  we  really  are,  they 
would  be  a  little  amazed;  but  the  cleverest, 
the  acutest  men  are  often  under  an  illusion 
about  women.  They  do  not  read  them  in  a  true 
light;  they  misapprehend  them,  both  for  good 
and  evil :  their  good  woman  is  a  queer  thing,  half 
doll,  half  angel;  their  bad  woman  almost  always 
a  fiend.  Then  to  hear  them  fall  into  ecstasies 
with  each  other's  creations,  worshipping  the 
heroine  of  such  a  poem — novel — drama,  think- 
ing it  fine, — divine!  Fine  and  divine  it  may  be, 
but  often  quite  artificial — false  as  the  rose  in  my 
best  bonnet  there.  If  I  spoke  all  I  think  on 
this  point,  if  I  gave  my  real  opinion  of  some 
first-rate  female  characters  in  first-rate  works, 
where  should  I  be?  Dead  under  a  cairn  of 
avenging  stones  in  half-an-hour. " 

"After  all,"  says  Caroline,  "authors'  heroines 
are  almost  as  good  as  authoresses'  heroes." 

"Not  at  all,"  Shirley  replies.  "Women  read 
men  more  truly  than  men  read  women.  I  '11 
prove  that  in  a  magazine  article  some  day  when 
I  've  time;  only  it  will  never  be  inserted;  it  will 
be  'declined  with  thanks,'  and  left  for  me  at 
the  publisher's." 

The  greater  part  of  the  men  in  Shirley  were 
drawn  from  life,  and  are  as  true  to  their  sex  as 
were  the  heroines  of  Dickens,  Thackeray,  or 


Charlotte  Bronte  269 

Disraeli,  who  were  then  writing.  As  for  the 
curates,  they  are  perfect.  No  man's  hand 
could  have  executed  their  portraits  so  skilfully. 
They  have  no  more  real  use  in  the  story  than 
they  seem  to  have  had  in  their  respective  par- 
ishes. But  this  daughter  of  a  country  vicar, 
who  knew  nothing  of  the  London  cockney,  who 
was  then  enlivening  the  books  of  Dickens, 
seized  upon  the  funniest  people  she  knew,  the 
curates,  and  they  have  been  immortalised. 

There  is  often  in  Charlotte  Bronte's  novels  a 
separation  of  plot  and  character,  as  if  they 
formed  themselves  independently  in  her  mind. 
This  is  especially  true  of  Shirley.  At  that  time 
the  attention  of  England  was  directed  toward 
the  manufacturing  towns  of  Lancashire  and 
Yorkshire.  Mrs.  Trollope  and  Harriet  Mar- 
tineau  had  written  upon  conditions  of  life 
there.  In  Sybil  Disraeli  considered  broadly 
the  underlying  causes  of  the  misery  of  the 
operatives.  Mrs.  Gaskell  wrote  Mary  Barton, 
a  story  of  Manchester  life,  the  same  year  that 
Charlotte  Bronte  was  writing  Shirley.  The  plot 
of  the  last  named  is  laid  in  the  early  years  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  and  turns  upon  the 
opposition  of  the  workmen  to  the  introduction 
of  machinery.  But  the  plot  and  characters  are 
constantly  getting  in  each  other's  way  and 
tripping  each  other  up.  Though  the  book  is  full 
of  defects,  one  cannot  judge  it  harshly.  When 


270    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

she  began  the  funny  description  of  the  curates' 
tea-drinking,  her  brother  and  sisters  were  with 
her.  Before  it  was  finished,  she  and  her  father 
were  left  alone.  But  at  this  time  the  public 
demanded  melodrama.  Fires,  drownings,  and 
death-beds  were  popular  methods  of  untying 
hard  knots  and  of  playing  upon  the  emotions  of 
the  reader.  She,  like  Mrs.  Gaskell,  constantly 
resorts  to  outside  circumstances  to  help  put 
things  to  rights  when  they  are  drifting  in  the 
wrong  direction,  circumstances  which  Jane 
Austen  would  not  have  admitted  in  a  book  of 
hers. 

Before  Charlotte  Bronte  wrote  Jane  Eyre  or 
Shirley,  she  had  finished  The  Professor,  and 
offered  it  to  different  publishers,  but  it  was 
rejected  by  all.  Finally  she  herself  lost  faith 
in  it,  and  transformed  it  into  the  beautiful  story 
of  Villette,  where  the  school  of  Madame  and 
Monseiur  He'ger  in  Brussels  is  made  immortal. 
In  the  plot  of  Villette,  as  in  the  plot  of  Jane 
Eyre  and  of  Shirley,  many  extraneous  events 
happen  which  are  either  unexpected  or  un- 
necessary. Like  Jane  Eyre,  Villette  is  steeped 
in  the  romantic  spirit,  but  the  hard  light  of 
reason  again  dispels  the  illusion.  In  the  man- 
agement of  the  supernatural  Charlotte  is  far 
inferior  to  Emily.  The  explanation  of  the  nun 
in  Villette  is  even  childish.  It  is  the  mistake 
made  by  Mrs.  Radcliffe,  by  nearly  all  writers 


Charlotte  Bronte  271 

of  the  age  of  reason.  They  give  a  ray,  as  it 
were,  a  whisper  from  the  mysterious  world 
which  surrounds  that  which  is  manifest  to  our 
everyday  senses.  Be  it  the  fourth  dimension, 
or  what  not,  we  catch  for  a  moment  a  message 
from  this  other  world,  which,  even  indistinct, 
still  tells  us  that  this  visible  world  is  not  all,  that 
there  is  something  beyond.  Then,  with  hard 
common-sense,  they  deny  their  own  message, 
and,  so  doing,  deny  to  us  the  world  of  mystery, 
and  leave  us  only  the  material  world  in  which 
to  believe.  Not  so  Emily  Bronte.  Not  so 
Scott  or  Shakespeare.  We  may  believe  in 
Hamlet's  ghost  or  not;  we  may  believe  or  not 
in  the  White  Lady  of  Avenel;  we  may  believe 
or  not  that  Catharine's  soul  hovered  near  Heath- 
cliff.  But  we  are  still  left  with  a  belief  in  the 
life  after  death,  and  still  believe  in  something 
beyond  experience,  and  still  grope  to  find  those 
things  in  heaven  and  earth  of  which  philosophy 
does  not  dream. 

But  the  characters,  not  the  plot,  remain  in 
the  mind,  after  reading  Villette.  Madame  Beck, 
whose  prototype  was  Madame  H£ger,  is  as 
clever  as  Cardinal  Wolsey  or  Cardinal  Richelieu ; 
but  she  uses  all  her  diplomatic  skill  in  the 
management  of  a  lady's  school,  which,  under 
her  ever  watchful  eye,  with  the  aid  of  duplicate 
keys  to  the  trunks  and  drawers  of  the  teachers 
and  pupils,  runs  without  friction  of  any  kind. 


272    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Lucy  Snowe,  the  English  teacher  in  Villette,  is 
far  more  pleasing  than  Jane  Eyre;  she  is  not  so 
passionate,  but  her  view  of  life  is  deeper  and 
broader,  and  consequently  kinder.  And  there 
is  Paul  Emanuel.  Who  would  have  believed  the 
rejected  professor  would  have  grown  into  that 
scholar  of  middle  age?  He  is  so  distinctly  the 
foreigner  in  showing  every  emotion  under  which 
he  is  labouring.  How  pathetic  and  how  lovable 
he  is  on  the  day  of  his  fete  when  he  thinks  that 
the  English  governess  has  forgotten  him,  and 
has  not  brought  even  a  flower  to  make  the  day 
happier  for  him!  So  fretful  in  little  things,  so 
heroic  in  large  things,  with  so  many  faults  which 
every  pupil  can  see,  but  with  so  many  virtues, 
frank  even  about  his  little  deceptions,  he  is  a 
lovable  man.  But  many  of  Miss  Bronte's 
readers  do  not  find  Paul  Emanuel  as  delightful 
as  Paulina,  the  womanly  little  girl  who  grows 
into  the  childlike  woman.  She  is  as  sensitive 
as  the  mimosa  plant  to  the  people  about  her. 
Every  event  of  her  childhood,  all  the  people  she 
cared  for  then,  remained  indelibly  imprinted  on 
her  mind,  so  that,  with  her,  friendship  and  love 
are  strong  and  abiding. 

Notwithstanding  their  many  defects,  Char- 
lotte Bronte's  novels  have  left  a  permanent 
impression  upon  English  fiction  and  have  won 
an  acknowledged  place  among  English  classics. 
She  first  made  a  minute  analysis  of  the  varying 


Charlotte  Bronte  273 

emotions  of  men  and  women,  and  noted  the 
strange,  unaccountable  attractions  and  repul- 
sions which  everybody  has  experienced.  Paulina, 
a  girl  of  six,  is  happy  at  the  feet  of  Graham,  a 
boy  of  sixteen,  although  he  is  unconscious  of  her 
presence.  And  so  instance  after  instance  can 
be  given  of  affinities  and  antipathies  which  lie 
beyond  human  reason.  She,  like  her  sister 
Emily,  though  with  less  clear  vision,  was  search- 
ing for  the  hidden  sources  of  human  feeling 
and  human  action. 

Charlotte  Bronte  wrote  to  a  friend: 
"I   always  through  my  whole  life  liked  to 
penetrate  to  the  real  truth;  I  like  seeking  the 
goddess  in  her  temple,  and  handling  the  veil, 
and  daring  the  dread  glance." 

Her  truthfulness  in  painting  emotion,  which 
to  her  own  generation  seemed  most  daring, 
even  coarse,  has  given  an  abiding  quality  to  her 
work.  And  besides  she  created  Paulina  and 
Paul  Emanuel. 

18 


CHAPTER  XVI 

Mrs.  Gaskell 

EVER  since  Eve  gave  Adam  of  the  forbidden 
fruit,  "and  he  did  eat,"  the  relative 
position  of  the  sexes  has  rankled  in  the  heart 
of  man.  The  sons  of  Adam  proclaim  loudly 
that  they  were  given  dominion  over  the  earth 
and  all  that  the  earth  contained;  but  they  have 
been  ever  ready  to  follow  blindly  the  beckoning 
finger  of  some  fair  daughter  of  Eve.  Perhaps 
it  is  a  consciousness  of  this  domination  of  the 
weaker  sex  that  has  led  man  to  proclaim  in  such 
loud  tones  his  mastery  over  woman,  having 
some  doubts  of  its  being  recognised  by  her 
unless  asserted  in  bold  language.  At  a  time 
when  the  novels  of  women  received  as  warm  a 
welcome  from  the  public  and  as  large  checks 
from  the  publishers  as  those  of  men,  a  writer 
whose  sex  need  not  be  given  thus  discussed 
their  relative  merits: 

"What   is   woman,    regarded    as   a    literary 
worker?     Simply  an  inferior  animal,  educated 
as  an  inferior  animal.     And  what  is  man?     He 
274 


Mrs.  Gaskell  275 

is  a  superior  being,  educated  by  a  superior 
being.  So  how  can  they  ever  be  equal  in  that 
particular  line?" 

Granted  the  premises,  there  can  be  but  one 
conclusion. 

The  perfect  assurance  with  which  men  have 
asserted  their  own  sufficiency  in  all  lines  of  art 
would  be  amusing  if  it  had  not  been  so  dis- 
astrous in  distorting  and  warping  at  least  three 
of  them:  music,  the  drama,  and  prose  fiction. 
As  slow  as  the  growth  of  spirituality,  has  been 
the  recognition  of  woman's  mental  and  moral 
power.  It  seems  almost  incredible  that  not 
many  years  ago  only  male  voices  were  heard  in 
places  of  amusement.  Deep,  rich,  full,  and 
sonorous,  no  one  disputes  the  beauty  of  the  male 
chorus;  but  modern  opera  would  be  impossible 
without  the  soprano  and  alto  voices,  and  Ma- 
dame Patti,  Madame  Sembrich,  and  Madame 
Lehman  have  proved  that  in  natural  gifts  and 
in  the  technique  of  art  women  are  not  inferior 
to  their  brethren. 

By  the  same  slow  process  women  have  won 
recognition  on  the  stage.  Even  in  Shake- 
speare's time  men  saw  no  reason  why  women 
should  acquire  the  histrionic  art.  Imagine 
Juliet  played  by  a  boy!  Yet  Essex,  Leices- 
ter, Southampton,  in  the  boxes,  the  ground- 
lings in  the  pit,  and  Ben  Jonson  sitting  as 
critic  of  all,  were  well  satisfied  with  it,  for  they 


276    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

were  used  to  it,  just  as  men  have  accepted 
the  heroines  of  their  own  novels,  though  every 
woman  they  meet  is  a  refutation  of  their  truth. 
It  only  needed  a  woman  in  a  woman's  part  to 
open  the  eyes  of  the  audience  to  all  they  had 
missed  before.  Not  until  the  Restoration,  did 
any  woman  appear  on  the  English  stage.  The 
following  lines  given  in  the  prologue  written 
for  the  revival  of  Othello,  in  which  the  part  of 
Desdemona  was  acted  for  the  first  time  by  a 
woman,  show  how  quick  critics  were  to  see  the 
folly  of  the  old  custom : 

For  to  speak  truth,  men  act,  that  are  between 
Forty  and  fifty,  wenches  of  fifteen, 
With  bone  so  large,  and  nerve  so  uncompliant, 
When  you  call  Desdemona,  enter  Giant. 

As  we  cannot  conceive  of  the  English  stage 
without  such  women  as  Mrs.  Siddons,  Charlotte 
Cushman,  and  Ellen  Terry,  so  we  cannot  con- 
ceive of  the  English  novel  without  such  writers 
as  Maria  Edgeworth,  Jane  Austen,  Mary  Mit- 
ford,  the  Brontes,  Elizabeth  Gaskell,  and  George 
Eliot,  each  one  of  whom  carried  some  phase 
of  the  novel  to  so  high  a  point  that  she  has  stood 
pre-eminent  in  her  own  particular  line.  Too 
often  we  confuse  art  with  its  subject-matter. 
If  it  requires  as  much  skill  to  give  interest  to  the 
everyday  occurrences  of  the  home  as  to  the 
thrilling  adventures  abroad;  to  depict  the  life 


Mrs.  Gaskell  277 

of  women  as  the  life  of  men;  to  reveal  the  joys 
and  sorrows  of  a  woman's  heart  as  the  exulta- 
tions and  griefs  of  man's;  then  these  women 
deserve  a  place  equal  to  that  held  by  Richard- 
son, Fielding,  Scott,  Dickens,  and  Thackeray. 
Their  art,  as  their  subject-matter,  is  different. 
With  the  exception  of  George  Eliot,  they  have 
not  virility  with  its  strength  and  power,  but 
they  have  femininity,  no  less  strong  and  power- 
ful, a  quality  possessed  by  Scott,  but  by  no 
other  of  these  masculine  writers,  with  the 
possible  exception  of  Dickens,  and  in  him  it  is 
a  femininity,  which  tends  to  run  to  sentimen- 
talism,  a  different  characteristic. 

Elizabeth  Gaskell,  one  of  the  most  feminine 
of  writers,  is  so  well  known  as  the  author  of 
Cranford,  that  delightful  village  whose  only 
gentleman  dies  early  in  the  story,  that  many 
of  its  readers  do  not  know  that  its  author  was 
better  known  by  her  contemporaries  through 
her  humanitarian  novels,  in  which  she  dis- 
cussed the  great  problems  that  face  the  poor. 

Mrs.  Gaskell,  whose  maiden  name  was  Ste- 
venson, was  born  in  Chelsea  in  1810.  She 
spent  the  greater  part  of  her  childhood  and  girl- 
hood at  the  home  of  her  mother's  family,  Knuts- 
ford  in  Cheshire,  the  place  she  afterward  made 
famous  under  the  name  of  Cranford.  In  1832, 
she  married  the  Reverend  William  Gaskell, 


278    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

minister  of  the  Unitarian  chapel  in  Manchester, 
and  that  city  became  her  home.  She  took  an 
active  interest  in  all  the  affairs  of  the  city,  and 
constantly  visited  the  poor.  Her  husband's 
father,  besides  being  the  professor  of  English 
History  and  Literature  in  Manchester  New 
College,  a  Unitarian  institution,  was  a  manu- 
facturer; thus  Mrs.  Gaskell  had  the  opportunity 
of  hearing  both  sides  of  the  controversy  which 
was  then  waging  between  labour  and  capital. 

In  the  early  forties,  there  was  much  suffering 
among  the  "mill-hands";  many  were  dying  of 
starvation,  and  consequently  there  were  many 
strikes  and  uprisings.  These  conditions  led  to 
her  writing  her  first  novel,  Mary  Barton.  The 
book  was  written  during  the  years  1845-1847, 
although  it  was  not  published  until  1848.  The 
nucleus  of  it,  Mrs.  Gaskell  wrote  -to  a  friend, 
was  John  Barton.  Since  she  herself  was  con- 
stantly wondering  at  the  inequalities  of  fortune, 
which  permitted  some  to  starve,  while  others 
had  abundance,  how  must  it  affect  an  ignorant 
man,  himself  on  the  verge  of  starvation,  and 
filled  with  pity  for  the  sufferings  of  his  friends? 
Driven  almost  insane  by  the  condition  of  society, 
and  hoping  to  remedy  it,  he  commits  a  crime, 
which  preys  so  upon  his  conscience  that  it  finally 
wears  out  his  own  life. 

Mrs.  Gaskell  in  this,  her  first  novel,  has  left 
an  undying  picture  of  that  section  of  smoky 


Mrs.  Gaskell  279 

Manchester  where  the  mill- workers  live:  its 
narrow  lanes;  small  but  not  uncomfortable 
cottages,  well  supplied  with  furniture  in  days 
when  work  was  plentiful,  but  destitute  even  of 
a  fire  when  it  was  scarce;  the  undersized  men 
and  women,  with  irregular  features,  pale  blue 
eyes,  sallow  complexions,  but  with  an  intelli- 
gence rendered  quick  and  sharp  by  their  life 
among  the  machinery,  and  by  their  hard  strug- 
gle for  existence.  The  life  of  the  poor  had 
often  furnished  a  theme  for  the  poets,  but  it  was 
the  life  of  shepherds  and  milkmaids,  above  whom 
the  blue  sky  arched,  and  whose  labours  were 
brightened  by  the  songs  of  the  birds,  and  the 
colours  and  sweet  odours  of  fruit  and  flowers. 
But  Mrs.  Gaskell  described  the  life  of  the  poor 
in  a  town  where  factory  smoke  obscured  the 
light  of  the  sun,  and  where  the  weariness  of 
labour  was  rendered  more  intense  by  the  clanging 
factory  bell,  and  the  constant  whirr  of  machinery 
ringing  in  their  ears.  It  is  a  gloomy  picture, 
but  no  gloomier  than  the  reality. 

Disraeli  in  Sybil  discussed  the  questions  of 
labour  and  capital  in  their  relations  to  the  his- 
tory of  England,  with  a  broad  intellectual  grasp 
of  the  sociological  causes  which  produced  these 
conditions.  He  wrote  in  the  interests  of  two 
classes,  the  Crown  and  the  People,  with  the 
hope  that  England  might  again  have  a  free 
monarchy  and  a  prosperous  people.  It  is  a 


28o    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

well  illustrated  treatise  on  government,  but  the 
principles  advocated  or  discussed  always  over- 
shadow the  characters.  He  had  no  such  intimate 
knowledge  of  the  lives  of  the  poor  as  had  Mrs. 
Gaskell.  She  conducts  us  to  the  homes  of  John 
Barton,  George  Wilson,  and  Job  Legh,  shows 
the  simplicity  of  their  lives,  and  their  sense  of 
the  injustice  under  which  they  are  suffering,  and 
their  helpfulness  to  each  other  in  times  of  need. 
How  simple  and  true  is  the  friendship  that 
binds  Mary  Barton,  the  dressmaker's  appren- 
tice; Margaret,  the  blind  singer;  and  Alice 
Wilson,  the  aged  laundress,  whose  mind  is  con- 
stantly dwelling  on  the  green  fields  and  running 
brooks  of  her  childhood's  home.  These  women 
possess  the  strength  of  character  of  the  early 
Teutonic  women.  They  are  reticent,  not  given 
to  the  exchange  of  confidences,  but  ready  to 
help  a  friend  with  all  they  have  in  the  hour  of 
need.  When  Margaret  thinks  that  the  Bartons 
are  in  want  of  money,  she  says  to  Mary,  "  Re- 
member, if  you  're  sore  pressed  for  money,  we 
shall  take  it  very  unkind  if  you  do  not  let  us 
know."  But  she  does  not  question  her.  Later 
when  her  great  trouble  comes  to  Mary  Barton, 
which  she  must  bear  alone,  when  she  must  free 
a  lover  from  the  charge  of  murder  without  in- 
criminating her  father,  she  shows  presence  of 
mind,  clearness  of  vision,  and  both  moral  and 
physical  courage. 


Mrs.  Gaskell  281 

Jem  Wilson,  the  hero  of  the  story,  is  as  strong 
as  Mary  Barton,  the  heroine.  Although  Dickens 
was  writing  of  the  poor,  he  always  found  some 
means  to  educate  his  heroes,  and  generally 
placed  them  among  gentlemen.  Jem  Wilson's 
education  was  received  in  the  factory,  and  the 
little  rise  he  made  above  his  fellows  was  due  to 
his  better  understanding  of  machinery.  He 
was  a  working  man,  proud  of  his  skill,  and  of  his 
good  name  for  honesty  and  sobriety. 

The  plot  of  Mary  Barton  is  highly  melo- 
dramatic, and  its  technique  is  open  to  criticism. 
It  should  not  be  read,  however,  for  the  story, 
but  for  the  many  home  scenes  in  which  we  come 
into  close  sympathy  with  the  men  and  women 
of  Manchester.  There  is  no  novel  in  which  we 
feel  more  strongly  the  heart-beats  of  humanity. 
It  leaves  the  impression,  not  of  art,  but  of  life. 

Mrs.  Gaskell  turned  again  to  the  struggles 
between  labour  and  capital  for  the  plot  of  her 
novel  North  and  South.  Between  this  story 
and  Mary  Barton  she  had  written  Cranford  and 
Ruth,  but  her  mind  seemed  to  revert,  as  it  were, 
from  the  peaceful  village  life  to  the  stirring 
mill-towns  of  Lancashire.  The  great  contrast 
between  life  in  the  counties  of  England  pre- 
sided over  by  the  landed  gentry,  and  that  in 
the  counties  where  the  manufacturers  formed 
the  aristocracy,  suggested  this  book.  It  was 
published  in  1855,  seven  years  after  Mary 


282    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Barton.  The  plot  of  North  and  South  is  better 
proportioned  than  is  that  of  Mary  Barton. 
There  are  fewer  characters,  better  contrasted. 
It  is  a  brighter  picture,  with  more  humour,  but 
it  does  not  leave  so  strong  an  impression  on  the 
mind  as  does  the  earlier  work.  Both,  however, 
are  more  accurate  than  Hard  Times,  a  book 
with  which  Dickens  himself  was  highly  dis- 
satisfied. He  knew  little  of  the  life  in  the 
manufacturing  districts,  but,  in  a  spirit  of  indig- 
nation at  the  poverty  brought  on  by  grasping 
manufacturers,  he  caricatured  the  entire  class 
in  the  persons  of  Mr.  Gradgrind  and  Mr.  Boun- 
derby.  When  these  men  are  compared  with 
the  manufacturers  as  represented  in  North  and 
South,  Mrs.  Gaskell's  more  intimate  knowledge 
of  them  is  at  once  apparent. 

Mrs.  Gaskell  had  been  accused  of  taking  sides 
with  the  working  men,  and  representing  their 
point  of  view  in  Mary  Barton.  In  North  and 
South,  the  hero,  Mr.  Thornton,  is  a  rich  manu- 
facturer, a  fine  type  of  the  self-made  man,  but 
standing  squarely  on  his  right  to  do  what  he 
pleases  in  his  own  factory.  "He  looks  like  a 
person  who  would  enjoy  battling  with  every 
adverse  thing  he  could  meet  with — enemies, 
winds,  or  circumstances,"  was  Margaret  Hale's 
comment  when  she  first  met  him.  "He's 
worth  fighting  wi',  is  John  Thornton,"  said 
one  of  the  leaders  of  the  strike.  For  although 


Mrs.  Gaskell  283 

the  condition  of  affairs  in  the  mill-towns  had 
much  improved  since  John  Barton  went  to 
London  as  a  delegate  from  his  starving  towns- 
men, and  was  refused  a  hearing  by  Parliament, 
a  large  part  of  the  book  is  concerned  with  the 
story  of  a  strike,  which  in  its  outcome  brought 
starvation  to  many  of  the  men,  and  bankruptcy 
to  some  of  the  masters,  the  acknowledged 
victors. 

Higgins,  one  of  the  leaders  of  the  working  men, 
is  a  true  Lancashire  man,  and  like  Thornton, 
the  leader  of  the  masters,  has  many  traits  of 
character  as  truly  American  as  English.  His 
sturdy  independence  is  well  shown  in  Margaret's 
first  interview  with  him.  The  daughter  of  a 
vicar  in  the  south  of  England,  she  had  been 
accustomed  to  call  upon  the  poor  in  her  fa- 
ther's parish.  Learning  that  Higgins's  daughter, 
Bessy,  is  ill  she  expresses  her  desire  to  call 
upon  her.  "I  'm  none  so  fond  of  having 
stranger  folk  in  my  house,"  Higgins  informs 
her,  but  he  finally  relents  and  says,  "Yo  may 
come  if  yo  like." 

But  besides  the  conflict  between  the  manu- 
facturers and  their  employees,  with  which  much 
of  the  book  is  concerned,  there  is  the  sharp 
contrast  between  the  Hales,  born  and  bred  in 
the  south  of  England,  and  the  mill-owners  in 
whose  society  they  are  placed.  Mr.  Hale, 
indecisive,  inactive,  in  whom  thought  is  more 


284    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

powerful  than  reality,  is  as  helpless  as  a  child 
among  these  men  of  action,  and  utterly  unable 
to  cope  with  the  problems  they  are  facing. 
Margaret,  the  refined  daughter  of  a  poor  clergy- 
man, is  contrasted  with  the  proud  Mrs.  Thorn- 
ton, the  mother  of  a  wealthy  manufacturer,  who 
would  make  money,  not  birth,  the  basis  of 
social  distinctions.  But  Margaret  is  even  better 
contrasted  with  the  poor  factory  girl,  Bessy 
Higgins,  who  turns  to  her  for  help  and  sympathy. 
There  is  hardly  a  story  of  Mrs.  Gaskell's  which 
is  not  adorned  by  the  friendship  of  the  heroine 
for  some  other  woman  in  the  book. 

In  both  these  novels,  she  taught  that  the  only 
solution  of  the  great  problem  of  capital  and 
labour  was  a  recognition  of  the  fact  that  their 
interests  were  identical,  and  that  friendly  inter- 
course was  the  only  means  of  breaking  down 
the  barrier  that  divided  them. 

Mrs.  Gaskell  was  so  versatile,  she  touched 
upon  so  many  problems  of  human  life,  that  it 
is  almost  impossible  to  summarise  her  work. 
Ruth  considers  the  question  of  the  girl  who  has 
been  betrayed.  Ruth  is  as  pure  as  Tess  of  the 
D'Urbervilles,  and  like  her  is  a  victim  of  cir- 
cumstances. A  stranger  who  has  taken  her 
under  her  protection  reports  that  Ruth  is  a 
widow,  and  Ruth  passively  acquiesces  in  the 
deception,  hoping  that  her  son  may  never  know 
the  disgrace  of  his  birth.  But  the  truth  comes 


Mrs.  Gaskell  285 

to  light,  involving  in  temporary  disgrace  Ruth 
and  her  son,  and  the  household  of  Mr.  Benson, 
the  dissenting  minister  whose  home  had  been 
her  place  of  refuge.  But  Mrs.  Gaskell  is  always 
optimistic.  By  her  good  deeds,  Ruth  wins  the 
love  and  honour  of  the  entire  community.  This 
novel  was  loudly  assailed.  It  was  claimed  that 
Mrs.  Gaskell  had  condoned  immorality,  and  it 
was  considered  dangerous  teaching  that  good 
deeds  were  an  atonement  for  such  a  sin.  But 
if  Ruth  found  detractors,  it  also  found  warm 
admirers,  who  recognised  the  broader  teach- 
ings of  the  story.  Mrs.  Jameson  wrote  to  Mrs. 
Gaskell: 

"I  hope  I  do  understand  your  aim — you  have 
lifted  up  your  voice  against  'that  demoralising 
laxity  of  principle, '  which  I  regard  as  the  ulcer 
lying  round  the  roots  of  society;  and  you  have 
done  it  wisely  and  well,  with  a  mingled  courage 
and  delicacy  which  excite  at  once  my  gratitude 
and  my  admiration." 

The  scene  of  Sylvia's  Lovers  is  laid  in  Whitby, 
at  a  time  when  the  press-gang  was  kidnapping 
men  for  the  British  navy.  It  is  a  story  of  the 
loves,  jealousies,  and  sorrows  of  sailors,  shop- 
keepers, and  small  farmers,  among  whom  Sylvia 
moves  as  the  central  figure.  Du  Maurier,  who 
illustrated  the  second  edition  of  this  novel,  was 
so  charmed  with  the  heroine  that  he  named 
his  daughter  Sylvia  for  her.  This  story,  like 


286    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Ruth,  has  much  of  the  sentimentalism  so  fash- 
ionable in  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century. 
The  leading  canon  of  criticism  at  that  time  was 
the  power  with  which  a  writer  could  move  the 
emotions  of  the  reader,  and  the  novelist  was 
expected  either  to  convulse  his  readers  with 
laughter  or  dissolve  them  into  tears.  There 
are  many  funny  scenes  in  Sylvia's  Lovers,  but 
the  key-note  is  pathos.  Like  many  novels  of 
Dickens,  there  are  death-bed  scenes  introduced 
only  for  the  luxury  of  weeping  over  sorrows 
that  are  not  real,  and  there  are  melodramatic 
situations  as  in  her  other  books.  Parts  of  this 
novel  suggested  to  Tennyson  the  poem  of 
Enoch  Arden. 

But,  however  powerful  may  be  the  novels 
dealing  with  the  questions  that  daily  confront 
the  poor,  there  is  a  perennial  charm  in  the  so- 
ciety of  people  who  dwell  amid  rural  scenes. 
Mrs.  Gaskell  has  written  several  short  stories 
of  the  pastoral  type.  Such  a  story  is  Cousin 
PJiillis.  It  is  a  beautiful  idyl  and  reminds  one 
of  the  old  pastorals  in  which  ladies  and  gentle- 
men played  at  shepherds  and  shepherdesses. 
Cousin  Phillis  cooks,  irons,  reads  Dante,  helps 
the  haymakers,  falls  in  love,  and  mends  a  broken 
heart,  and  is  brave,  true,  and  unselfish.  Her 
father  is  what  one  would  expect  from  such  a 
daughter.  He  cultivates  his  small  farm,  finds 
rest  from  his  labours  in  reading,  and  neglects 


Mrs.  Gaskell  287 

none  of  the  many  duties  which  belong  to  him 
as  the  dissenting  minister  of  a  small  village. 

Cranford  and  Wives  and  Daughters  have  this 
in  common,  that  the  scene  of  both  is  laid  in  the 
village  of  Knutsford.  The  former  is  a  rambling 
story  of  events  in  two  or  three  households,  and 
of  the  social  affairs  in  which  all  the  village  is 
concerned.  It  is  without  doubt  the  favourite 
of  Mrs.  Gaskell's  novels.  Wives  and  Daughters 
was  Mrs.  Gaskell's  last  story,  and  was  left  un- 
finished at  her  death.  It  shows  a  great  artistic 
advance  over  her  earlier  work.  The  plot  is 
more  natural;  it  has  not  so  many  sharp  con- 
trasts, which  George  Eliot  criticised  in  Mrs. 
Gaskell's  stories.  The  characters  are  also  more 
subtle.  Molly,  the  daughter  of  the  village 
doctor,  is  an  unselfish,  thoughtful  girl,  but  with 
none  of  that  unreal  goodness  which  Dickens 
sometimes  gave  to  his  heroines.  When  she 
receives  her  first  invitation  to  a  child's  party, 
and  her  father  is  wondering  whether  or  not  she 
can  go,  her  speech  is  characteristic  of  her  nature: 

"Please,  Papa, — I  do  wish  to  go — but  I  don't 
care  about  it." 

Molly  feels  very  keenly,  and  longs  for  things 
with  all  the  strength  of  an  ardent  nature,  but 
she  always  subordinates  herself  and  her  wishes 
to  others.  In  the  character  of  Cynthia,  Mrs. 
Gaskell  makes  a  plea  for  the  heartless  coquette. 
Cynthia  is  beautiful,  she  likes  to  please  those 


288    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

in  whose  company  she  finds  herself,  but  quickly 
forgets  the  absent.  It  is  not  her  fault  that 
young  men's  hearts  are  brittle,  for  it  is  as  natural 
for  her  to  smile,  and  be  gay  and  forget,  as  it  is 
for  Molly  to  love,  be  silent,  and  remember.  So 
it  is  Cynthia  who  has  the  lovers,  while  Molly 
is  neglected.  Clare,  Cynthia's  mother,  is  more 
selfish  than  her  daughter,  but  she  has  learned 
the  art  of  seeming  to  please  others  while  think- 
ing only  of  pleasing  herself.  She  is  as  crafty  as 
Becky  Sharp,  but  softer,  more  feline,  and  more 
subtle;  a  much  commoner  type  in  real  life 
than  Thackeray's  diplomatic  heroine. 

Mr.  A.  W.  Ward,  in  the  biographical  intro- 
duction to  the  Knutsford  Edition  of  her  novels, 
says  of  her  later  work: 

"When  Mrs.  Gaskell  had  become  conscious 
that  if  true  to  herself,  to  her  own  ways  of  look- 
ing at  men  and  things,  to  the  sympathies  and 
hopes  with  which  life  inspired  her,  she  had  but 
to  put  pen  to  paper,  she  found  what  it  has  been 
usual  to  call  her  later  manner — the  manner  of 
which  Cranford  offered  the  first  adequate  illus- 
tration, and  of  which  Cousin  Phillis  and  Wives 
and  Daughters  represent  the  consummation." 

The  same  critic  compares  the  later  work  of 
Mrs.  Gaskell  with  the  later  work  of  George 
Sand  and  finds  that  "in  their  large-heartedness " 
they  are  similar.  He  also  gives  George  Sand's 
tribute  to  her  English  contemporary.  "Mrs. 


Mrs.  Gaskell  289 

Gaskell,"  she  said,  "has  done  what  neither  I 
nor  other  female  writers  in  France  can  accom- 
plish: she  has  written  novels  which  excite  the 
deepest  interest  in  men  of  the  world,  and  yet 
which  every  girl  will  be  the  better  for  reading. " 

It  is  not  often  that  a  novelist  finds  another 
writer  to  take  up  and  enlarge  her  work  as  did 
Mrs.  Gaskell.  Her  novels  contain  the  germ  of 
much  of  George  Eliot's  earlier  writings.  The 
Moorland  Cottage  suggested  many  parts  of  The 
Mill  on  the  Floss.  Edward  and  Maggie  Brown 
— the  former  important,  consequential  and  dic- 
tatorial, the  latter  self -forgetful,  eager  to  help 
others,  and  by  her  very  eagerness  prone  to 
blunders — were  developed  by  George  Eliot  into 
the  characters  of  Tom  and  Maggie  Tulliver. 
The  weak  and  fretful  mothers  in  the  two  books 
are  much  alike,  while  the  love  story  and  the 
catastrophe  have  the  same  general  outline. 

They  both  drew  largely  from  the  working 
people  of  the  North  or  of  the  Midlands,  and 
both  constantly  introduced  Dissenters.  Silas 
Marner  belongs  to  the  manufacturing  North, 
and  the  people  of  Lantern  Yard  are  of  the  same 
class  as  those  of  Manchester  and  Milton.  Felix 
Holt  and  Adam  Bede  belong  to  the  same  type 
as  Jem  Wilson  and  Mr.  Thornton,  while  Esther 
Lyon  is  not  unlike  Margaret  Hale.  Both  often 
presented  life  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  poor. 

Both  were  interested  in  the  development  of 


290   'Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

character,  and  in  the  changes  which  it  under- 
went for  good  or  evil  under  the  influence  of 
outward  circumstances.  But  George  Eliot  had 
greater  intellectual  power  than  Mrs.  Gaskell. 
She  had  the  broader  view  and  the  deeper  insight. 
Mrs.  Gaskell  could  never  have  conceived  the 
plots  nor  the  characters  of  Romola  nor  Middle- 
march.  She  constantly  introduced  extraneous 
matter  to  shape  her  plots  according  to  her  will, 
while  with  George  Eliot  the  fate  of  character  is 
as  hard  and  unyielding  as  was  the  fate  of  predes- 
tination in  the  sermons  [of  the  old  Calvinistic 
divines.  Mrs.  Gaskell,  like  Dickens,  introduced 
death-bed  scenes  merely  to  play  upon  the  emo- 
tions. George  Eliot  was  never  guilty  of  this 
defect ;  with  her,  character  is  a  fatalism  that  is 
inexorable. 

But  Mrs.  Gaskell  had  a  more  hopeful  view 
of  life  than  had  George  Eliot.  The  Unitarians 
believe  in  man  and  have  faith  in  the  clemency 
of  God.  This  makes  them  a  cheerful  people. 
However  dark  the  picture  that  Mrs.  Gaskell 
paints,  we  have  faith  that  conditions  will  soon 
be  better,  and  at  the  close  of  the  book  we  see 
the  dawn  of  a  brighter  day.  George  Eliot  had 
taken  the  suggestions  of  Mrs.  Gaskell  and  ampli- 
fied them  with  many  details  that  the  woman 
of  lesser  genius  had  omitted.  But  to  each  was 
given  her  special  gift.  If  George  Eliot's  char- 
acters stand  out  as  more  distinct  personalities, 


Mrs.  Gaskell  291 

they  are  drawn  with  less  sympathy.  George 
Eliot's  men  and  women  are  often  hard  and  sharp 
in  outline;  Mrs.  Gaskell's,  no  matter  how  poor 
or  ignorant,  are  softened  and  refined. 

It  was  this  quality  that  made  it  possible  for 
her  to  write  that  inimitable  comedy  of  manners, 
Cranford.  Her  other  novels  with  their  deep 
pathos,  strong  passion,  and  dramatic  situations 
must  be  read  to  show  the  breadth  of  her  powers, 
but  Cranford  will  always  give  its  author  a  unique 
place  in  literature.  Imagine  the  material  that 
furnished  the  groundwork  of  this  story  put  into 
the  hands  of  any  novelist  from  Richardson  to 
Henry  James.  It  seems  almost  like  sacrilege 
to  think  what  even  Jane  Austen  might  have 
said  of  these  dear  elderly  ladies.  As  for  Thack- 
eray, their  little  devices  to  keep  up  appearances 
would  have  seemed  to  him  instances  of  feminine 
deceit,  and  he  might  have  put  even  Miss  Jen- 
kyns  with  her  admiration  of  Dr.  Johnson  into 
his  Book  of  Snobs.  What  tears  Dickens  would 
have  drawn  from  our  eyes  over  the  love  story 
of  Miss  Matty  and  Mr.  Holbrook.  How  George 
Eliot  would  have  mourned  over  the  shallow- 
ness  of  their  lives.  Henry  James  would  have 
squinted  at  them  and  their  surroundings  through 
his  eye-glass  until  he  had  discovered  every  faded 
spot  on  the  carpet  or  skilful  darn  in  the  curtain. 
Miss  Mitford  would  have  appreciated  these 
ladies  and  loved  them  as  did  Mrs.  Gaskell,  only 


292    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

she  would  have  been  so  interested  in  the  flowers 
and  birds  and  clouds  that  she  would  have  for- 
gotten all  about  the  Cranford  parties,  and  would 
probably  have  ignored  the  presence  in  their 
midst  of  the  Honourable  Mrs.  Jamieson,  the 
sister-in-law  of  an  earl.  So  we  must  conclude 
that  only  Mrs.  Gaskell  could  make  immortal  this 
village  of  femininity,  where  to  be  a  man  was 
considered  almost  vulgar,  but  into  which  she 
has  introduced  one  of  the  most  chivalrous 
gentlemen  in  the  person  of  Captain  Browne, 
and  one  of  the  most  faithful  of  lovers  in  the 
person  of  Mr.  Holbrook,  while  no  book  has 
a  more  lovable  heroine  than  fluttering,  indeci- 
sive Miss  Matty,  over  whose  fifty  odd  years  the 
sorrows  of  her  youth  have  cast  their  lengthening 
shadows. 

Mary  Barton  is  a  work  of  genius.  Only  a 
woman  of  high  ideals  could  have  drawn  the 
character  of  Margaret  Hale,  an  earlier  Marcella, 
or  Molly  Gibson,  or  Mr.  Thornton,  or  Mr.  Hoi- 
man.  Only  a  woman  of  deep  insight  could  have 
created  a  woman  like  Ruth:  a  book  which  in  its 
problem  and  its  deep  earnestness  reminds  one 
of  Aurora  Leigh.  But  her  readers  will  always 
love  Mrs.  Gaskell  for  the  sake  of  the  gentle 
ladies  of  Cranford. 


CONCLUSION 

MRS.  GASKELL  died  on  the  twelfth  of 
November,  1865.  Of  the  novelists  who 
have  been  considered  in  this  book  only  three 
survived  her,  Mrs.  Bray,  Mrs.  S.  C.  Hall,  and 
Harriet  Martineau,  but  they  added  little  to  prose 
fiction  after  that  date.  During  the  third  quarter 
of  the  nineteenth  century,  however,  the  number 
of  books  written  by  women  continued  to  in- 
crease each  year.  Julia  Kavanagh  was  the 
author  of  several  novels,  the  first  of  which 
The  Three  Paths,  was  published  in  1848;  all  her 
stories  were  written  with  high  moral  aim  and 
delicacy  of  feeling.  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  by 
Harriet  Beecher  Stowe,  published  in  1850,  is 
probably  the  most  powerful  novel  ever  written 
to  plead  the  cause  of  oppressed  humanity. 
Dinah  Maria  Muloch  Craik  kept  up  the  interest 
in  the  domestic  novel;  her  most  popular  book, 
John  Halifax,  Gentleman,  has  lost  none  of  its 
charm  for  young  women,  even  if  it  does  not  meet 
the  requirements  of  a  classic.  Mrs.  Henry  Wood 
is  still  remembered  as  the  author  of  the  melo- 
dramatic East  Lynne,  but  her  best  stories  are  the 
293 


294    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

Johnny  Ludlow  Papers,  which  deal  with  char- 
acter alone;  her  popularity  is  attested  by  the 
fact  that  more  than  a  million  copies  of  her  books 
have  been  issued.  Charlotte  Yonge's  forgotten 
novels  were  classed  among  the  Church  Stories, 
because  they  contain  so  much  piety  and  de- 
votion. Of  a  different  type  was  Miss  de  la 
Rame'e,  who  wrote  under  the  name  of  Ouida; 
she  had  fine  gifts  of  word-painting,  but  a  fond- 
ness for  the  questionable  in  conduct.  Miss 
Braddon,  the  author  of  Lady  Alley's  Secret, 
excelled  in  complicated  plots.  Mrs.  Oliphant 
has  been  a  most  versatile  writer,  and  followed 
almost  every  style  of  prose  fiction;  her  do- 
mestic stories  are  generally  considered  her  best. 
Anne  Thackeray,  better  known  as  Mrs.  Ritchie, 
the  daughter  of  the  great  novelist,  has  written 
several  novels,  all  of  which  have  a  delightfully 
feminine  touch.  Miss  Rhoda  Broughton  has 
entertained  the  reading  public  by  love  stories 
which  hold  the  attention  until  the  marriage  takes 
place.  But  all  these  women  fade  into  insig- 
nificance beside  George  Eliot,  whose  first  story, 
The  Sad  Fortunes  of  the  Rev.  Amos  Barton, 
appeared  in  Black-wood's  Magazine  in  1857,  and 
whose  last  novel,  Daniel  Deronda,  was  published 
nearly  twenty  years  later,  in  1876. 

It  seems  strange  that  any  reader  of  her  books 
should  have  thought  them  the  product  of  a 
man's  brain,  as  was  at  first  believed.  For, 


Conclusion  295 

notwithstanding  her  power  in  developing  a  plot, 
her  breadth  of  view,  and  her  mental  grasp,  her 
genius  is  essentially  feminine.  She  excelled 
in  analysis  of  character,  in  attention  to  details, 
in  ethical  teaching,  and  in  artistic  truthfulness, 
the  qualities  in  which  women  have  been  pre- 
eminent. Only  a  woman's  pen  could  have 
drawn  such  characters  as  Dinah  Morris,  Mag- 
gie Tulliver,  and  Dorothea  Casaubon,  or  could 
have  followed  the  minute  and  subtle  influences 
under  which  the  plot  of  Middlemarck  is  shaped. 
George  Eliot  has  left  a  larger  portrait  gallery 
of  women  than  any  other  novelist.  Not  only 
has  she  drawn  different  grades  of  society,  but, 
what  is  perhaps  a  more  difficult  task,  she  has 
drawn  the  different  grades  of  spiritual  greatness 
and  moral  littleness.  She  brought  the  psycho- 
logical novel  to  a  degree  of  perfection  which  has 
never  been  surpassed. 

Mrs.  Oliphant  has  thus  written  of  George  El- 
iot's place  in  literature: 

"Another  question  which  has  been  constantly 
put  to  this  age,  and  which  is  pushed  with 
greater  zeal  every  day,  as  to  the  position  of 
women  in  literature  and  the  height  which  it  is 
in  their  power  to  attain,  was  solved  by  this 
remarkable  woman,  in  a  way  most  flattering 
to  all  who  were  and  are  fighting  the  question  of 
equality  between  the  two  halves  of  mankind; 
for  here  was  visibly  a  woman  who  was  to  be 


296    Woman's  Work  in  Fiction 

kept  out  by  no  barriers,  who  sat  down  quietly 
from  the  beginning  of  her  career  in  the  highest 
place,  and,  if  she  did  not  absolutely  excel  all 
her  contemporaries  in  the  revelation  of  the 
human  mind  and  the  creation  of  new  human 
beings,  at  least  was  second  to  none  in  those 
distinguishing  characteristics  of  genius." 

We  are  too  near  the  nineteenth  century  to 
decide  as  to  the  relative  positions  of  its  great 
novelists.  At  one  time  George  Eliot  was  placed 
at  the  head  of  all  writers  of  fiction,  with  Dick- 
ens and  Thackeray  as  rivals  for  the  second  place. 
But  she  was  dethroned  by  Thackeray,  and  there 
are  signs  that  the  final  kingship  will  be  given  to 
Charles  Dickens,  unless  Scott  receives  it  instead. 

Fashions  in  novels  change  at  least  every  fifty 
years.  Exciting  plots  and  situations,  strong 
emotional  scenes,  sharp  contrasts,  are  not  de- 
manded by  present  readers,  who  also  turn  away 
with  disgust  from  the  saintly  heroine  and  the  irre- 
claimable villain.  Of  the  many  volumes  of  fiction 
written  in  the  eighteenth  century  only  two  are 
in  general  circulation  to-day,  Robinson  Crusoe 
and  The  Vicar  of  Wakefield.  But  all  those  once 
popular  novels,  even  if  their  very  names  are 
now  forgotten,  have  done  their  work  in  shaping 
the  thought  and  morals  of  their  own  and  suc- 
ceeding generations. 


INDEX 

Abbott,  The,  137 

Absentee,  The,  61,  112—113,  122 

Ada  Reis,  203 

Adam  Bede,  84,  289,  295 

Addison,  Joseph,  21,  28 

Adeline  Mowbray,  or  the  Mother  and  Daughter,  150-153 

Adventures  of  an  Atom,  23 

Afflicted  Parent,  The,  or  the  Undutiful  Child  Punished, 

Age  of  Wordsworth,  The,  193 
Agnes  Grey,  258-259,  261,  265 
Ainsworth,  William  Harrison,  216,  239 
Alderson,  Miss,  see  Opie,  Amelia 
Amorous  Friars,  or  the  Intrigues  of  a  Convent,  42 
Amos  Barton,  294 

Amours  of  Prince  Tarquin  and  Miranda,  18 
Antiquary,  The,  102,  104 
Arabian  Nights,  15,  233 
Arblay,  Madame  D',  see  Burney,  Frances 
Arblay,  Madame  D',  Essay  on,  57-58,  61,  168-169 
Arden,  Enoch,  187 
Arnold,  Matthew,  257 
Artless  Tales,  139 
Athencsum,  The,  194,  256 
Aurora  Leigh,  292 

Austen,  Jane,  39,  45,  60,  101,  157-178,  179,  180,  191, 
195,  196,  216,  263,  270,  276,  291 

Baillie,  Joanna,  154,  155 

Balzac,  Honore*  de,  170 

Banker's  Wife,  The,  225 

Barbauld,  Mrs.  Anna  Letitia,  121 

Barrett,  Miss,  see  Browning,  Elizabeth 

Barring  Out,  The,  125 

Bas  Bleu,  62,  63 

Beauty  Put  to  its  Shifts,  or  the  Young  Virgin's  Rambles,  42 

297 


298  Index 

Behn,  Aphra,  i,  13-19 

Belfprd  Regis,  193-196 

Belinda,  121,  177 

Beside  the  Bonny  Brier  Bush,  137 

Betsy  Thoughtless,  Miss,  The  History  of,  36-39,  46,  48 

Bithynia,  An  Adventure  in,  233 

Blackwood's  Magazine,  107,  294 

Blake,  William,  2 

Blazing  World,  Description  of  a  New  World  Called  the, 

6-7 

Blessington,  Lady,  232,  233 
Blind  Harry  the  Minstrel,  143,  144 
Bonheur,  Rosa,  i 
Book  of  Snobs,  The,  291 
Boswell,  James,  138 
Bousset,  3 

Braddon,  Mary  Elizabeth,  294 
Bray,  Ann  Eliza,  216,  225-230,  232,  293 
Bride  of  Lammermoor,  The,  256 
Bronte,  Anne,  249,  250,  257-261 
Bronte,  Charlotte,  85,   174,  210,   249,   250,   256,   258, 

261-273 

Bronte,  Emily,  248,  249-257,  258,  267,  270,  271,  273 
Brontes,  The,  247-273,  276 
Brooke  and  Brooke  Farm,  242 
Broughton,  Rhoda,  294 

Browning,  Elizabeth  Barrett,  81,  103,  190,  242 
Brunton,  Alexander,  156 
Brunton,  Mary,  41,  149,  153—156,  262 
Bubbled  Knights,  or  Successful  Contrivances,  42 
Bulwer,  Edward,  Lord  Lytton,  200,  216,  223 
Burke,  Edmund,  46,  54,  62 
Burney,  Charles,  46 

Burney,  Frances,  39,  45—61,  168,  176,  177,  181,  195 
Byron,  Lord  (George  Gordon),  109,  200-206,  210-213, 

257 

Caleb  Williams,  73 

Camilla,  or  a  Picture  of  Youth,  59—60,  176,  177 

Canterbury  Tales,  The,  106-110 

Caroline  Evelyn,  The  History  of,  47 

Carter,  Elizabeth,  62 

Castle  of  Otranto,  The,  88 

Castle  Rackrent,  111-112,  117 

Castles  of  Athlyn  and  Dunbayne,  89 


Index  299 

Cavendish,  Margaret,  see  Newcastle,  Duchess  of 
Cavendish,  William,  see  Newcastle,  Duke  of 
Cecil,  or  the  Adventures  of  a  Coxcomb,  217-219 
Cecilia,  or  Memoirs  of  an  Heiress,  54-59,  60,  61,  78, 

176,  177 
Celestina,  80 
Chap-Books,  67 
Chapone,  Hester,  62 
Chaucer,  Geoffrey,  106 
Cheap  Repository,  The,  67-71 
Childe  Harold,  200,  219 
Clarendon,  Earl  of  (Edward  Hyde),  10 
Clarissa  Harlowe,  8,  26,  30,  171 
Clelia,  32 
Clubman,  The,  219 
Coelebs  in  Search  of  a  Wife,  71-72 
Coleridge,  Ernest  Hartley,  109 
Collier,  Jeremy,  61 
Colman,  George,  42,  43,  46 
Confessions  of  a  Pretty  Woman,  233 
Congreve,  William,  217 
Cooper,  James  Fenimore,  16 
Corneille,  3 

Cottagers  of  Glenburnie,  The,  16 
Cottin,  Sophie,  Madame  de,  262 
Court  Gazette,  20 

Courtenay  of  Walreddon;  a  Romance  of  the  West,  227 
Cousin  Phillis,  286-287,  288,  292 
Crabbe,  George,  263 
Craik,  Dinah  Maria  Muloch,  293 
Craik's  English  Prose,  245 
Cranford,  277,  281,  287,  288,  291-292 
Crewe,  Catherine,  232 
Cry  of  the  Children,  The,  242 
Curtis,  George  William,  174 

Daniel  Deronda,  294 

Dante,  Alighieri,  286 

David  Copperfield,  164 

David  Simple,  26-31 

Deerbrook,  243 

Defoe,  Daniel,  146 

De  Foix,  or  Sketches  of  the  Manners  and  Customs  of  the 

Fourteenth  Century,  226 
Desmond,  74-77,  80 


300  Index 

Destiny,  181,  182,  183,  185,  186-187 

Diana  of  the  Crossways,  103 

Dickens,  Charles,  56,  69,  76,  77,  87,  102,  116,  164,  231, 

236,  240,  247,  264,  268,  269,  277,  281,  282,  286, 

290,  291,  296 
Discipline,  155 

Disraeli,  Benjamin,  87,  200,  216,  247,  269,  279 
Dombey  and  Son,  225 

Domestic  Manners  of  the  Americans,  235-236 
Dry den,  John,  13 
Duchess  of  Malfi,  The,  256 
Du  Maurier,  285 

East  Lynne,  293 

Edgeworth,  Maria,  102,   111-128,  130,   131,   133,   155, 

179,  180,  181,  182,  183,  196,  197,  216,  243,  276 
Edgeworth,  Richard  Lovell,  115,  118,  119,  121,  124 
Eighteenth  Century,  History  of  the,  44 
Elia,  see  Lamb,  Charles 
Eliot,  George,  84,  109,  119,  164,  174,  276,  277,  289-291, 

294-296 

Emma,  161—162,  166—167,  168,  170 
Emmeline,  155 
Ennui,  113,  122 
Enoch  \Araen,  286 
Epipsychidion,  214 

Essay  on  Irish  Bulls,  see  Irish  Bulls,  Essay  on 
Essay  on  Madame  D'Arblay,  see  Arblay,  Madame  Dy , 

Essay  on 
Ethelinda,  79 

Evans,  Marian,  see  Eliot,  George 
Evelina,  or  a  Young  Lady's  Entrance  into  the  World,  39, 

46,  47-54,  55,  59,  61,  78,  l64,  i?6,  J77 
Evelyn,  John,  5 
Evening  Chronicle,  231 
Examiner,  22 

Fair  Jilt,  The,  18 

Falkland,  200,  216 

Falkner,  214 

Fantom,   Mr.:  or   the    History  of   the   New-Fashioned 

Philosopher,  and  his  Man  William,  68,  72 
Felix  Holt,  289 

Female  Education,  Strictures  on  the  Modern  System  of,  71 
Female  Quixote,  The,  32-35 


Index  301 


Ferrier,  Susan  Edmonstone,  179—188,  189,  216 

Fielding,  Henry,  16,  24,  25,  26,  27,  34,  48,  101,  116,  277 

Fielding,  Saran,  23,  24,  26-31 

Fits  of  Fitz-Ford,  227 

F/^Vs  in  Amber,  233 

Florence  Macarthy,  129 

Fortnightly  Review,  185 

Fox,  Charles  James,  40 

Frankenstein,  or  the  Modern  Prometheus,  206-207,  215 

Fraser's  Magazine,  231 

Froissart's  Chronicles,  226 

Gait,  John,  216 

Garnett,  Sir  Richard,  214 

Garrick,  David,  41,  46,  62 

Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  245 

Gaskell,    Elizabeth    Cleghorn,     247,     267,     269,     270, 

274-293 

Genlis,  Stephanie  Felicite,  Comtesse  de,  118,  262 
Gentleman's  Magazine,  The,  101 
Gibbon,  Edward,  54 
Glenarvon,  200—203 
Godwin,     Mary    Wollstonecraft,     see    Wollstonecraft, 

Mary 

Godwin,  William,  73,  150,  179,  205,  210,  221 
Goethe,  Johann  Wolfgang  von,  174 
Goldsmith,  Oliver,  79 

Gore,  Catherine  Grace  Frances,  216-225,  233 
Gosse,  Edmund,  170 
Grand  Cyrus,  The,  15,  32,  121 
Gulliver's  Travels,  23 
Guy  Mannering,  102 

Hackney  Coachman,  The,  70 

Hall,  Anna  Maria  (Mrs.  S.  C.),  72,  179,  196—199,  216, 

293 

Hall,  S.  C.,  140 

Hamilton,  Elizabeth,  133-137 

Hamiltons,  The,  224 

Hamlet,  271 

Hard  Times,  282 

Hardy,  Thomas,  86,  170 

Harriet  Stuart,  The  Life  of,  31 

Harry,  Blind,  the  Minstrel,  see  Blind  Harry  the  Min- 
strel 


302  Index 

Haywood,  Eliza,  24,  36-39,  48 
Heir  of  Selwood,  The,  223,  225 
Helen,  119 
Henrietta,  35 
Henry  de  Pomeroy,  227 
Henry  Esmond,  145 
Heptameron,  The,  2 
Herford,  C.  H.,  193 

Hints  towards  Forming  the  Character  of  a  Young  Prin- 
cess, 71 

Homer,  2,  n,  175 
Horace,  217 

Hour  and  the  Man,  The,  242,  244-245 
Huet,  Bishop,  Pierre  Daniel,  46 
Humphry  Clinker,  8,  24,  44 
Hungarian  Brothers,  139 

Ibrahim,  32,  121 

Ida,  or  the  Woman  of  Athens,  131 

Impetuous  Lover,  The,  or  the  Guiltless  Parricide,  43 

Inchbald,  Elizabeth,  41,  73,  82-87,  I05.  IJ9,  221,  262 

Inheritance,  The,  181,  182-183,  184,  185,  187-188 

Irish  Bulls,  Essay  on,  1 1 5-1 16 

Irish  Peasantry,  Stories  of  ilie,  197,  198 

Italian,  The,  91,  94,  97,  98,  99,  100,  101 

Ivanhoe,  164 

ackson,  Helen  Hunt  (H.  H.),  16 

ames,  G.  P.  R.,  216,  239 

ames,  Henry,  291 

ameson,  Mrs.  (Anna),  285 
'Jane  Eyret  41,  82,  85,  250,  261,  263,  264-267,    270, 

272 

Jealous  Wife,  Tlte,  233 
Jeffrey,  Francis,  180 
Joan  of  Arc,  i 

John  Halifax,  Gentleman,  293 
Johnny  Ludlow  Papers,  294 
Johnson,  R.  Brimley,  245 
Johnson,  Dr.  Samuel,  30,  31,  32,  39,  42,  46,  48,  55,  60, 

62,  103,  128,  138,  291 
Jonathan  Jefferson  Whitlaw,  The  Life  and  Adventures 

°f,  237-239,  242 
Jonson,  Ben,  275 
Joseph  Andrews,  16,  36,  52 


Index  303 

Journey  to  Bath,  41 

Jules  Verne,  see  Verne,  Jules 

Kauffman,  Angelica,  103 

Kavanagh,  Julia,  293 

King  Lear,  see  Lear 

Knox,  John,  188 

Kruitzener,  or  the  German's  Tale,  108-109 

Lady  Audley's  Secret,  294 

Lady  Clare,  183 

Lady  of  Lyons,  The,  223 

Lady's  Magazine,  190 

Lafayette,  Madame  de,  3,  19,  41,  262 

Lamb,  Lady  Caroline,  200-204 

Lamb,  Charles,  8,  12,  193 

Lamb,  William  (Lord  Melbourne),  200,  201,  202,  203, 

204 

Landlady's  Tale,  The,  109 
Lang,  Andrew,  102 
Lanier,  Sidney,  25 
Last  Man,  The,  210—212 
Lazy  Lawrence,  125,  126 
Lear,  King,  256 
Lee,  Harriet,  88,  105-110 
Lee,  Sophia,  88,  105-110,  139 
Lennox,  Charlotte,  24,  31-36 
Letters  of  the  Duchess  of  Newcastle,  7-8 
Letters  to  Young  Ladies,  62 
Lewis,  Matthew  Gregory,  101 
"Library  of  Old  Authors,"  Russell  Smith,  12 
Life  of  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  see  Newcastle,  Life  of  the 

Duke  of 

Lights  and  Shadows  of  Irish  Life,  197-198 
Lmy  Daw  son,  The  Story  of,  232 
Literary  Gazette,  202 
Lodore,  212-214 
Longueville,  Duchesse  de,  3 
Lucius,  22 
Lytton,  Bulwer,  see  Bulwer,  Edward  (Lord  Lytton) 

Macaulay,  Thomas  Babington,  57,  61,  113,  168 

Machiavelli,  Niccolo,  207 

Mackay,  Sheriff,  143 

Magyar,  The,  and  the  Moslem,  233 


304  Index 

Man  and  Superman,  160 

Manchester  Strike,  A,  243 

Manley,  Mary,  i,  19-23,  36 

Mansfield  Park,  61,  162-164,  171,  172 

Marcella,  292 

Margaret,  Queen  of  Xavarre,  2 

Marriage,  181,  182,  184 

Marsh,  Anne,  231 

Martineau,  Harriet,  231,  232,  242-246,  269,  293 

Mary  Barton,  269,  278—281,  282,  283,  289,  292 

Masson,  David,  179 

Maturin,  Charles  Robert,  101 

Mazeppa,  206 

M^moires  du  Comte  de  Comminges,  262 

Memoir es  pour  servir  a  Vhistoire  de  la  vertu,  42 

Memoirs  of  a  Certain  Island  Adjacent  to  Utopia,  36 

Michael  Armstrong,  The  Life  and  Adventures  of,  241 

Middlemarch,  2 go,  295 

Midsummer  Eve,  a  Fairy  Tale  of  Love,  198-199 

Mill  on  the  Floss,  The,  289,  295 

Mitford,  Mary  Russell,  81,  144,  179,  183,  189-196,  216, 

221,  227,  276,  291,  292 
Monastery,  The,  137,  271 
Monk,  The,  101 
Montagu,  Elizabeth,  62 
Montagu,  Mary  Wort  ley,  233 
Monthly  Review,  77 

Monumental  Effigies  of  Great  Britain,  226 
Moore,  Thomas,  131 
Moorland  Cottage,  The,  289 
More,  Hannah,  62-72,  73 
Morgan,  Lady,  in,  197,  216 
Music,  History  of,  46 
Mysteries  of  Udolpho,  The,  91,  92,  94,  95,  96,  99,  101, 

104,  105,  141 

Nature  and  Art,  85-86 

Nature's  Pictures  Drawn  by  Fancy's  Pencil,  7 

New  Atalantis,  19-23 

Newcastle,  Duchess  of,  i,  3—13 

Newcastle,  Duke  of,  4,  8,  9,  10,  n,  12 

Newcastle,  Life  of  the  Duke  of,  10-12 

Nodes  Ambrosiance,  183 

Nocturnal  Reverie,  79 

North,  Christopher  (John  James  Wilson),  183,  185 


Index  305 

North  and  South,  281-284,  289,  292 
Northanger  Abbey,  101,  160-161,  177 
Notre  Dame  de  Paris,  256 
"Novelists'  Library,"  121 
Novels  by  Eminent  Hands,  217 
Nun,  The,  or  the  Perjured  Duty,  18 

O'Briens,  The,  and  the  O' Flaherty s,  129,  130-131 

O'Donnel,  129-130 

Odyssey,  113 

Old  English  Baron,  The,  88,  89 

Old  Manor  House,  The,  77-78,  79,  80 

Oliphant,  Mrs.  Margaret,  294,  295 

Opie,  Mrs.  Amelia,  41,  73,  149-153,  156,  216,  262 

Orange  Girl  of  St.  Giles's,  The,  69-70 

Ormond,  113—115 

Oroonoko,  13-18,  237,  242 

Orphans,  The,  126 

Othello,  276 

Ouida,  294 

Our  Village,  189,  190-193,  195,  196,  243 

Owenson,  Sydney,  see  Morgan,  Lady 

Pamela,  8,  17,  18,  24,  31,  35,  46,  78,  164,  266 

Paradise  Lost,  72,  79 

Pardoe,  Julia,  231-234 

Pastor's  Fireside,  The,  146 

Patronage,  119 

Pelham,  200 

Pendennis,  200 

Per  kin  Warbeck,  The  Fortunes  of,  214 

Persuasion,  158,  162-164,  167,  170,  172 

Phillips,  Wendell,  244 

Pickwick  Papers,  56 

Pilgrimages  to  English  Shrines,  72 

Pin  Money,  222-223 

Plato,  ii 

Political  Economy  Tales,  242-243 

Polly  Honeycomb,  42,  43 

Pope,  Alexander,  22,  79,  160 

Porter,  Anna  Maria,  133,  137-140,  216 

Porter,  Jane,  133,  137,  138,  140-148,  216 

Preferment,  or  My  Uncle  the  Earl,  220 

Provost,  Abb£,  42 


306  Index 

Pride  and  Prejudice,  157,  158-159,  161,  164,  166,  170, 

171,  173,  175,  176,  178 
Princess  of  Cleves,  The,  41,  262 
Professor,  The,  270 

Quarterly  Review,  131,  147,  148 

Radcliffe,  Ann,  88,  89—105,  108,  179,  270 

Rambouillet,  Marquise  de,  3 

Ram6e,  Louise  de  la,  see  Ouida 

Ramsey,  Charlotte,  see  Lennox,  Charlotte 

Rape  of  the  Lock,  22 

Rasselas,  46 

Recess,  The,  105—106 

Reeve,  Clara,  88-89 

Refugee  in  America,  The,  237 

Richardson,  Samuel,  8,  9,  17,  24,  26,  30,  31,  34,  36,  37, 

48,  101,  154,  171,277,  291 
Rights  of  Man,  64 
Rights  of  Woman,  Vindication  of  the,  see  Vindication  of 

the  Rights  of  Woman 
Ritchie,  Mrs.,  126,  294 
Rival  Beauties,  The,  233 
Rivals,  The,  41,  43 
Rob  Roy,  102 
Robinson  Crusoe,  146,  296 
Rogers,  Samuel,  201 

Romance  of  the  Forest,  The,  91,  92,  93,  97,  101 
Romance  of  the  Harem,  The,  233 
Romance  of  the  West,  A,  228 
Romeo  and  Juliet,  275 
Romola,  290 

Rousseau,  Jean  Jacques,  73,  118 
Ruskin,  195 
Ruth,  281,  284-285,  286,  292 

St.  Ronan's  Well,  174 

Saintsbury,  George,  185,  186 

Sand,  George,  262,  263,  288 

Sappho,  i 

Schlosser,  44 

Scott,  Sir  Walter,  18,  36,  102,  103,  104,  105,  118,  128, 
141,  144,  155,  164,  173,  179,  180,  181,  184,  216, 
225,  228,  229,  230,  264,  271,  277,  296 

Scottish  Chiefs,  The,  142-145 


Index  307 

Scuderi,  Mile,  de,  3,  19,  32,  33,  35,  120,  121 

Seasons,  The,  79 

Secret  Intrigues  of  the  Count  of  Caramania,  The,  36 

Selborne,  The  Natural  History  and  Antiquities  of,  191 

Self -Control,  154-155,  156 

Sense  and  Sensibility,  159—160,  161,  170,  171 

Sevigne',  Madame,  de,  3 

Shakespeare,  William,  5,  103,  128,  168,  169,  170,  174, 

271,  275 

Shakespeare,  Essay  on  the  Genius  of,62    ' 
Shaw,  Bernard,  160 
Shelley,  Mary,  200,  204-215,  262 
Shelley,  Percy  Bysshe,  204,  205,  206,  208,  210-214 
Shepherd  of  Salisbury  Plain,  The,  68,  69,  72 
Sheridan,  Mrs.  Frances,  24,  39-42 
Sheridan,  Richard  Brinsley,  40,  41 
Shirley,   267-270 
Sicilian  Romance,  The,  91,  93,  94 
Sidney  Biddulph,  The  Memoirs  of  Miss,  39—42,  74 
Silas  Marner,  289 
Simple  Story,  A,  82-84,  262 
Simple  Susan,  126—127 
Simple  Tales,  153 
Sir  Charles  Grandison,  8,  37,  53 
Sir  Edward  Seaward1  s  Narrative,  146-148 
Sister,  The,  35 
Sketches  by  Boz,  241 
Sketches  of  English  Character,  219-220 
Sketches  of  Irish  Character,  196-197 
Smith,  Charlotte,  41,  73-82,  87,  102,  103,  105,  191,  221 
Smith  Russell,  "Library  of  Old  Authors,"  see  "Library 

of  Old  Authors" 

Smollett,  Tobias,  8,  23,  24,  88,  101,  179 
Soldier  of  Lyons,  The,  a  Tale  of  the  Tuileries,  223 
Sothern,  Thomas,  13,  15 
Souza,  Madame  de,  262 
Spectator  Papers,  7,  29 

Stael,  Madame  de  (Anne  Louise  Necker),  262,  263 
Steele,  Richard,  21,  22,  28 
Sterne,  Laurence,  24,  25,  88,  102,  169 
Stories  of  the  Irish  Peasantry,  see  Irish  Peasantry,  Stories 

Stothard,  Charles,  226 

Stowe,  Harriet  Beecher,  15,  238,  293 

Swift,  Jonathan,  22,  23 


3o8 


Index 


Swinburne,  Charles  Algernon,  256 
Sybil,  269,  279 
Sylvia's  Lovers,  285-286 

Taine,  25 

Talba,  The,  or  Moor  of  Portugal,  226 

Tale  of  Two  Cities,  145 

Tales  of  Fashionable  Life,  119-120 

Tales  of  my  Landlord,  The,  181 

Tales  of  Real  Life,  153 

Tales  that  Never  Die,  127 

Taller,  The,  22,  29 

Tenant  of  Wildfell  Hall,  The,  259-261 

Tencin,  Mme.  de,  262 

Tennyson,  Alfred,  Lord,  183,  286 

Tess  of  the  D'Urbervilles,  284 

Thackeray,  Anna  Isabella,  see  Ritchie,  Mrs. 

Thackeray,  William  Makepeace,  87,  102,  116,  120,  164, 

176,  216,  217,  231,  237,  247,  264,  277,  288,  291,  296 
Thaddeus  of  Warsaw,  140-141 
Theresa  Marchmont,  217 
Thomas  the  Rhymer,  104 
Thrale,  Mrs.  (Mrs.  Piozzi),  48 
Three  Paths,  The,  293 
T intern  Abbey,  93 
Tolstoi,  Count  Leo,  86,  1 70 
Tom  Jones,  26,  37,  53,  141 
Tourgenieff,  170 
Trelawny  of  Trelawne;  or  the  Prophecy:   a  Legend  of 

Cornwall,  228 

Trollope,  Anthony,  234,  239 
Trollope,  Frances,  231,  232,  234-242,  243,  269 

Udolpho,  The  Mysteries  of,  see  Mysteries  of  Udolpho, 

The 

Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,  15,  238,  293 
Undine,  254 

Valperga:  or  the  Life  and  Adventures   of  Castruccio, 

Prince  of  Lucca,  207-210 
Vanity  Fair,  164,  288 
Venetia,  200 
Verne,  Jules,  6 
Vicar  of  Wakefield,  The,  46,  79,  296 


Index  309 

Vicar  of  Wrexhill,  The,  240 

Village  Politics:  Addressed  to  all  Mechanics,  Journey- 
men, and  Labourers  in  Great  Britain.  By  Will  Chip, 
a  Country  Carpenter,  64-65 

Villette,  270-273 

Vindication  of  the  Rights  of  Woman,  74,  149,  204 

Vivian,  119,  122 

Vivian  Grey,  200,  216,  217,  219 

Voltaire,  Francois,  73 

Wallace,  143 

Walpole,  Horace,  88,  89 

Wanderer,  The,  or  Female  Difficulties,  <Q   60 

Ward,  A.  W.f  288 

Ward,  Mrs.  Humphry,  267 

Warleigh,  or  the  Fatal  Oak;  a  Legend  of  Devon,  227 

Waste  Not,  Want  Not,  125 

Waverley,  45,  60,  137,  144,  155,  178 

Waverley  Novels,  102,  117,  145,  216 

Welsh,  Charles,  67,  127 

Werner,  or  the  Inheritance,  109 

Westminster  Review,  221,  224 

White,  Gilbert,  191 

White  Hoods,  The,  226 

Whole  Duty  of  Man,  64 

Widow  Barnaby,  239 

Widow  Married,  The,  239 

Widow  Wedded,  The,  or  the  Barnaby s  in  America,  239 

Wild  Irish  Girl,  The,  129 

Will  Chip,  a  Country  Carpenter,  see  Village  Politics 

Winchelsea,  Lady,  79 

Window  in  Thrums,  The,  137 

Windsor  Forest,  79 

Wives  and  Daughters,  287-288,  292,  293 

Wollstonecraft,  Mary,  73,  74,  149,  150,  204,  205,  210 

Wood,  Mrs.  Henry,  293 

Wordsworth,  William,  79,  93,  127,  165,  241 

Wuthering  Heights,  249,  256,  258,  261,  265,  267,  271 

Wycherley,  William,  13 

Yere-Batan-Serai,  234 
Yonge,  Charlotte  Mary,  294 


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